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| author | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 04:47:18 -0700 |
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| committer | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 04:47:18 -0700 |
| commit | a8f3f2343d424cce0f271d2e6bfaeda0a51c261e (patch) | |
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diff --git a/old/15679-h.htm.2020-12-14 b/old/15679-h.htm.2020-12-14 new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b475733 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/15679-h.htm.2020-12-14 @@ -0,0 +1,16939 @@ +<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> + <head> + <title> + The Project Gutenberg eBook of Burke's Writings and Speeches, Volume the Third, by Edmund Burke. + </title> + <style type="text/css"> + + <!-- /* old browser blockout*/ + /* <![CDATA[ XML blockout */ + + + +/* + * set the global font family + */ + /* { font-family: serif; } */ + +/* + * set the body margins + */ + body {margin-left: 8%; margin-right: 7%; + + } + +/* + * set the body text indention, and spacing, and leading + */ + p { /* all paragraphs unless overridden */ + margin-top: 1em; + margin-bottom: 0; + line-height: 1.4em; + } + + body > p { /* paras at <body> level - not in <div> or <table> */ + text-align: justify; + text-indent: 1em; + } + + p.break { margin-top: 2em; } /* use for some thought-breaks */ + + dd, li {/* loosen spacing in list items */ + margin-top: 0.33em; + line-height: 1.2em; } + +/* + * style h2 for chapter heads + */ + + h2 { text-align: center; /* left-aligned by default, left/right margins set globally */ + margin-top:2em; /* clear space above top border */ + /* border-left: 3px solid gray; REMOVED BY MP */ + /* border-top: 4px solid gray; */ + /* padding-left:2em; /* space in from left border */ + padding-top:0.5em; /* space down from top border */ + padding-bottom: 1em; /* push left border below text */ + clear: both; /* don't let sidebars overlap */ + } + +/* + * style h3 for topic heads + */ + h3 { + text-align: center; /* uncomment for centered heading */ + margin-top: 2em; + font-family: sans-serif; + font-weight: normal; /* override default of bold */ + font-size: 95%; + clear: both; /* don't let sidebars overlap */ + } + +/* + * suppress indentation on paragraphs following heads + */ + h1+p, h2+p, h3+p { text-indent: 0; } + +/* + * Style the blockquote tag and related: + * - inset left and right + * - one-point smaller font (questionable?) + * - <p class="citation"> right-just and italicized + * - <p class="signature"> deeply indented + */ + .blockquote { + margin-left: 5%; + margin-right: 5%; + } + p.citation { /* author citation at end of blockquote or poem */ + margin-left:20%; + text-align: left; + /* text-align: right; MP, I DON'T LIKE THIS */ + /* font-style: italic; MP, I DON'T LIKE THIS */ + } + p.quotdate { /* date of a letter aligned right */ + text-align: right; + } + p.quotsig { /* author signature at end of letter */ + margin-left: 35%; + text-indent: -4em; /* gimmick to move 2nd line right */ + } + p.noindent { /* For paras continuing after quote, table, etc. (where no indent in original) MP */ + text-indent: 0; + } +/* + * Provide a selection of special list enumeration styles + */ + ol.AL { list-style-type: lower-alpha; } + ol.AU { list-style-type: upper-alpha; } + ol.RU { list-style-type: upper-roman; } + ol.RL { list-style-type: lower-roman; } + dt { margin-top: 0.5em; } + /* turn off list decoration in a single item to form the + * second para of a 2-para item: < li class="off" > + * or make an unmarked list: < ul class="off" > + */ + .off { list-style-type: none; } /* 2nd para of a 2-para list item */ +/* + * In all browsers **except MSIE 5** the items of an "inside" list are + * indented as if they still had their symbol. + */ + ol.inside, ul.inside { + list-style-position: inside; + margin-left: -2.5em; /* For everybody but MSIE 5, boo */} +/* + * The TOC, LOI, and Index are unordered lists with no prefix symbols. + * The tocright class is used to right-align page numbers in a TOC + * (not to be confused with linenum, used for poetry line#s). + */ + +/* MP... 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(of 12), by Edmund Burke + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. III. (of 12) + +Author: Edmund Burke + +Release Date: April 22, 2005 [EBook #15679] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BURKE VOL III *** + + + + +Produced by Paul Murray, Susan Skinner and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team from images generously made +available by the Bibliotheque nationale de France +(BnF/Gallica) at http://gallica.bnf.fr + + + + + + +</pre> + +<p><a name="Page_-3" id="Page_-3" /></p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<h2>THE WORKS +<br /><br /> +<span style="font-size: 71%">OF</span> +<br /><br /> +THE RIGHT HONOURABLE<br /> + +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 200%">EDMUND BURKE</span></h2> + +<h3>IN TWELVE VOLUMES<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: smaller">VOLUME THE THIRD</span></h3> +<p /> + +<p /> +<p style="text-align: center; text-indent: 0"><b>London</b><br /> +<br /> + +JOHN C. NIMMO<br /> +<br /> +14, KING WILLIAM STREET, STRAND, W.C.<br /> +<br /> + +MDCCCLXXXVII<br /></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CONTENTS_OF_VOL_III" id="CONTENTS_OF_VOL_III" />CONTENTS OF VOL. III.</h2> +<p><a name="Page_-2" id="Page_-2" /><a name="Page_-1" id="Page_-1" /></p> + + + +<ul class="TOC"><li><a href="#NABOB_OF_ARCOTS_PRIVATE_DEBTS">SPEECH ON THE NABOB OF ARCOT'S DEBTS, February 28, 1785; + with an Appendix</a> <span class="tocright"><a href="#Page_1">1</a></span></li> + +<li><a href="#SUBSTANCE_OF_THE_SPEECH">SUBSTANCE OF SPEECH ON THE ARMY ESTIMATES, February 9, 1790</a> <span class="tocright"><a href="#Page_211">211</a></span></li> + +<li><a href="#REFLECTIONS">REFLECTIONS ON THE REVOLUTION IN FRANCE</a> <span class="tocright"><a href="#Page_231">231</a></span></li></ul> + +<p><a name="Page_0" id="Page_0" title="0"></a></p> +<p><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1" title="1" class="pagenum"></a></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="NABOB_OF_ARCOTS_PRIVATE_DEBTS" id="NABOB_OF_ARCOTS_PRIVATE_DEBTS" />SPEECH<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%">ON THE</span><br /> +<br /> +MOTION MADE FOR PAPERS<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%">RELATIVE TO THE</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 90%">DIRECTIONS FOR CHARGING THE NABOB OF ARCOT'S PRIVATE DEBTS TO EUROPEANS +ON THE REVENUES OF THE CARNATIC,</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 60%">FEBRUARY 28, 1785.</span><br /> +<br /> +WITH AN APPENDIX,<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%">CONTAINING SEVERAL DOCUMENTS.</span></h2> + + +<div class="blockquote"><p><span title="Entautha ti prattein hechrên andra tôn Platônos kai + Aristotelous zêlôtên dogmatôn; ara perioran anthrôpous athlious + tois kleptais ekdidomenous, ê kata dunamin antois amunein, oimai, + ôs êdê to kukneion exadousi dia to themises ergastêrion tôn + toioutôn; Emoi men oun aischrhon eivai dokei tous men + chiliarchous, otan leipôsi tên taxin, katadikazein ... tên de + hyper athliôn anthrôpôn hapoleipein taxin, otan deê pros kleptas + agônizesthai toioutous kai tauta tou thiou summachountos hêmin, + ôster oun etaxen." lang="el">Ἐνταῦθα τί πράττειν ἐχρῆν ἄνδρα τῶν Πλάτωνος καὶ Ἀριστοτέλους ζηλωτὴν δογμάτων; +ἆρα περιορᾶν ἀνθρώπους ἀθλίους τοῖς κλέπταις ἐκδιδομένους, ἢ κατὰ δύναμιν +αὐτοῖς ἀμύνειν, οἶμαι ὡς ἤδη τὸ κύκνειον; ἐξᾴδουσι διὰ τὸ θεμισές ἐργαστήριον +τῶν τοιούτων; Ἐμοὶ μὲν οὖν αἰσχρὸν εἶναι δοκεῖ τοὺς μὲν χιλιάρχους, ὅταν λείπωσι τὴν +τάξιν, καταδικάζειν' ... τὴν δὲ ὑπέρ ἀθλίων ἀνθρώπων ἀπολείπειν τάξιν, ὅταν δὲῃ +πρὸς κλέπτας ἀγωνίζεσθαι τοιούτους, καὶ ταῦτα τοῦ θεοῦ συμμαχοῦντος ἡμῖν, ὅσπερ +οὖν ἔταξεν.</span></p> + + +<p class="citation">JULIANI Epist. 17.<a name="Page_2" id="Page_2" title="2" class="pagenum"></a></p><p><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3" title="3" class="pagenum"></a></p></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="ADVERTISEMENT" id="ADVERTISEMENT" />ADVERTISEMENT.</h2> + + +<p>That the least informed reader of this speech may be enabled to enter +fully into the spirit of the transaction on occasion of which it was +delivered, it may be proper to acquaint him, that, among the princes +dependent on this nation in the southern part of India, the most +considerable at present is commonly known by the title of the Nabob of +Arcot.</p> + +<p>This prince owed the establishment of his government, against the claims +of his elder brother, as well as those of other competitors, to the arms +and influence of the British East India Company. Being thus established +in a considerable part of the dominions he now possesses, he began, +about the year 1765, to form, at the instigation (as he asserts) of the +servants of the East India Company, a variety of designs for the further +extension of his territories. Some years after, he carried his views to +certain objects of interior arrangement, of a very pernicious nature. +None of these designs could be compassed without the aid of the +Company's arms; nor could those arms be employed consistently with an +obedience to the Company's orders. He was therefore advised to form a +more secret, but an equally powerful, interest among the servants of +that Company, and among others both at home and abroad. By engaging them +in his interests, the use of the Company's power might be obtained +without their ostensible <a name="Page_4" id="Page_4" title="4" class="pagenum"></a>authority; the power might even be employed in +defiance of the authority, if the case should require, as in truth it +often did require, a proceeding of that degree of boldness.</p> + +<p>The Company had put him into possession of several great cities and +magnificent castles. The good order of his affairs, his sense of +personal dignity, his ideas of Oriental splendor, and the habits of an +Asiatic life, (to which, being a native of India, and a Mahometan, he +had from his infancy been inured,) would naturally have led him to fix +the seat of his government within his own dominions. Instead of this, he +totally sequestered himself from his country, and, abandoning all +appearance of state, he took up his residence in an ordinary house, +which he purchased in the suburbs of the Company's factory at Madras. In +that place he has lived, without removing one day from thence, for +several years past. He has there continued a constant cabal with the +Company's servants, from the highest to the lowest,—creating, out of +the ruins of the country, brilliant fortunes for those who will, and +entirely destroying those who will not, be subservient to his purposes.</p> + +<p>An opinion prevailed, strongly confirmed by several passages in his own +letters, as well as by a combination of circumstances forming a body of +evidence which cannot be resisted, that very great sums have been by him +distributed, through a long course of years, to some of the Company's +servants. Besides these presumed payments in ready money, (of which, +from the nature of the thing, the direct proof is very difficult,) debts +have at several periods been acknowledged to those gentlemen, to an +immense amount,—that is, to some millions of sterling money. There is +<a name="Page_5" id="Page_5" title="5" class="pagenum"></a>strong reason to suspect that the body of these debts is wholly +fictitious, and was never created by money <i>bonâ fide</i> lent. But even on +a supposition that this vast sum was really advanced, it was impossible +that the very reality of such an astonishing transaction should not +cause some degree of alarm and incite to some sort of inquiry.</p> + +<p>It was not at all seemly, at a moment when the Company itself was so +distressed as to require a suspension, by act of Parliament, of the +payment of bills drawn on them from India,—and also a direct tax upon +every house in England, in order to facilitate the vent of their goods, +and to avoid instant insolvency,—at that very moment, that their +servants should appear in so flourishing a condition, as, besides ten +millions of other demands on their masters, to be entitled to claim a +debt of three or four millions more from the territorial revenue of one +of their dependent princes.</p> + +<p>The ostensible pecuniary transactions of the Nabob of Arcot with very +private persons are so enormous, that they evidently set aside every +pretence of policy which might induce a prudent government in some +instances to wink at ordinary loose practice in ill-managed departments. +No caution could be too great in handling this matter, no scrutiny too +exact. It was evidently the interest, and as evidently at least in the +power, of the creditors, by admitting secret participation in this dark +and undefined concern, to spread corruption to the greatest and the most +alarming extent.</p> + +<p>These facts relative to the debts were so notorious, the opinion of +their being a principal source of the disorders of the British +government in India was so <a name="Page_6" id="Page_6" title="6" class="pagenum"></a>undisputed and universal, that there was no +party, no description of men in Parliament, who did not think themselves +bound, if not in honor and conscience, at least in common decency, to +institute a vigorous inquiry into the very bottom of the business, +before they admitted any part of that vast and suspicious charge to be +laid upon an exhausted country. Every plan concurred in directing such +an inquiry, in order that whatever was discovered to be corrupt, +fraudulent, or oppressive should lead to a due animadversion on the +offenders, and, if anything fair and equitable in its origin should be +found, (nobody suspected that much, comparatively speaking, would be so +found,) it might be provided for,—in due subordination, however, to the +ease of the subject and the service of the state.</p> + +<p>These were the alleged grounds for an inquiry, settled in all the bills +brought into Parliament relative to India,—and there were, I think, no +less than four of them. By the bill commonly called Mr. Pitt's bill, the +inquiry was specially, and by express words, committed to the Court of +Directors, without any reserve for the interference of any other person +or persons whatsoever. It was ordered that <i>they</i> should make the +inquiry into the origin and justice of these debts, as far as the +materials in <i>their</i> possession enabled them to proceed; and where +<i>they</i> found those materials deficient, <i>they</i> should order the +Presidency of Fort St. George (Madras) to complete the inquiry.</p> + +<p>The Court of Directors applied themselves to the execution of the trust +reposed in them. They first examined into the amount of the debt, which +they computed, at compound interest, to be 2,945,600<i>l.</i> sterling. +Whether their mode of computation, either <a name="Page_7" id="Page_7" title="7" class="pagenum"></a>of the original sums or the +amount on compound interest, was exact, that is, whether they took the +interest too high or the several capitals too low, is not material. On +whatever principle any of the calculations were made up, none of them +found the debt to differ from the recital of the act, which asserted +that the sums claimed were "<i>very</i> large." The last head of these debts +the Directors compute at 2,465,680<i>l.</i> sterling. Of the existence of +this debt the Directors heard nothing until 1776, and they say, that, +"although they had <i>repeatedly</i> written to the Nabob of Arcot, and to +their servants, respecting the debt, yet they <i>had never been able to +trace the origin thereof, or to obtain any satisfactory information on +the subject</i>."</p> + +<p>The Court of Directors, after stating the circumstances under which the +debts appeared to them to have been contracted, add as follows:—"For +these reasons we should have thought it our duty to inquire <i>very +minutely</i> into those debts, even if the act of Parliament had been +silent on the subject, before we concurred in any measure for their +payment. But with the positive injunctions of the act before us to +examine into their nature and origin, we are indispensably bound to +direct such an inquiry to be instituted." They then order the President +and Council of Madras to enter into a full examination, &c., &c.</p> + +<p>The Directors, having drawn up their order to the Presidency on these +principles, communicated the draught of the general letter in which +those orders were contained to the board of his Majesty's ministers, and +other servants lately constituted by Mr. Pitt's East India Act. These +ministers, who had just carried through Parliament the bill ordering a +<a name="Page_8" id="Page_8" title="8" class="pagenum"></a>specific inquiry, immediately drew up another letter, on a principle +directly opposite to that which was prescribed by the act of Parliament +and followed by the Directors. In these second orders, all idea of an +inquiry into the justice and origin of the pretended debts, particularly +of the last, the greatest, and the most obnoxious to suspicion, is +abandoned. They are all admitted and established without any +investigation whatsoever, (except some private conference with the +agents of the claimants is to pass for an investigation,) and a fund for +their discharge is assigned and set apart out of the revenues of the +Carnatic. To this arrangement in favor of their servants, servants +suspected of corruption and convicted of disobedience, the Directors of +the East India Company were ordered to set their hands, asserting it to +arise from their own conviction and opinion, in flat contradiction to +their recorded sentiments, their strong remonstrance, and their declared +sense of their duty, as well under their general trust and their oath as +Directors, as under the express injunctions of an act of Parliament.</p> + +<p>The principles upon which this summary proceeding was adopted by the +ministerial board are stated by themselves in a number in the appendix +to this speech.</p> + +<p>By another section of the same act, the same Court of Directors were +ordered to take into consideration and to decide on the indeterminate +rights of the Rajah of Tanjore and the Nabob of Arcot; and in this, as +in the former case, no power of appeal, revision, or alteration was +reserved to any other. It was a jurisdiction, in a cause between party +and party, given to the Court of Directors specifically. It was known +that the <a name="Page_9" id="Page_9" title="9" class="pagenum"></a>territories of the former of these princes had been twice +invaded and pillaged, and the prince deposed and imprisoned, by the +Company's servants, influenced by the intrigues of the latter, and for +the purpose of paying his pretended debts. The Company had, in the year +1775, ordered a restoration of the Rajah to his government, under +certain conditions. The Rajah complained, that his territories had not +been completely restored to him, and that no part of his goods, money, +revenues, or records, unjustly taken and withheld from him, were ever +returned. The Nabob, on the other hand, never ceased to claim the +country itself, and carried on a continued train of negotiation, that it +should again be given up to him, in violation of the Company's public +faith.</p> + +<p>The Directors, in obedience to this part of the act, ordered an inquiry, +and came to a determination to restore certain of his territories to the +Rajah. The ministers, proceeding as in the former case, without hearing +any party, rescinded the decision of the Directors, refused the +restitution of the territory, and, without regard to the condition of +the country of Tanjore, which had been within a few years four times +plundered, (twice by the Nabob of Arcot, and twice by enemies brought +upon it solely by the politics of the same Nabob, the declared enemy of +that people,) and without discounting a shilling for their sufferings, +they accumulate an arrear of about four hundred thousand pounds of +pretended tribute to this enemy; and then they order the Directors to +put their hands to a new adjudication, directly contrary to a judgment +in a judicial character and trust solemnly given by them and entered on +their records.<a name="Page_10" id="Page_10" title="10" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>These proceedings naturally called for some inquiry. On the 28th of +February, 1785, Mr. Fox made the following motion in the House of +Commons, after moving that the clauses of the act should be read:—"That +the proper officer do lay before this House copies or extracts of all +letters and orders of the Court of Directors of the United East India +Company, in pursuance of the injunctions contained in the 37th and 38th +clauses of the said act"; and the question being put, it passed in the +negative by a very great majority.</p> + +<p>The last speech in the debate was the following; which is given to the +public, not as being more worthy of its attention than others, (some of +which were of consummate ability,) but as entering more into the detail +of the subject.<a name="Page_11" id="Page_11" title="11" class="pagenum"></a></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>SPEECH.</h2> + + +<p>The times we live in, Mr. Speaker, have been distinguished by +extraordinary events. Habituated, however, as we are, to uncommon +combinations of men and of affairs, I believe nobody recollects anything +more surprising than the spectacle of this day. The right honorable +gentleman<a name="FNanchor_1_1" id="FNanchor_1_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_1" class="fnanchor" title=" Right Honorable Henry Dundas.">[1]</a> whose conduct is now in question formerly stood forth in +this House, the prosecutor of the worthy baronet<a name="FNanchor_2_2" id="FNanchor_2_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_2_2" class="fnanchor" title=" Sir Thomas Rumbold, late Governor of Madras.">[2]</a> who spoke after him. +He charged him with several grievous acts of malversation in office, +with abuses of a public trust of a great and heinous nature. In less +than two years we see the situation of the parties reversed; and a +singular revolution puts the worthy baronet in a fair way of returning +the prosecution in a recriminatory bill of pains and penalties, grounded +on a breach of public trust relative to the government of the very same +part of India. If he should undertake a bill of that kind, he will find +no difficulty in conducting it with a degree of skill and vigor fully +equal to all that have been exerted against him.</p> + +<p>But the change of relation between these two gentlemen is not so +striking as the total difference of their deportment under the same +unhappy circumstances. Whatever the merits of the worthy baro<a name="Page_12" id="Page_12" title="12" class="pagenum"></a>net's +defence might have been, he did not shrink from the charge. He met it +with manliness of spirit and decency of behavior. What would have been +thought of him, if he had held the present language of his old accuser? +When articles were exhibited against him by that right honorable +gentleman, he did not think proper to tell the House that we ought to +institute no inquiry, to inspect no paper, to examine no witness. He did +not tell us (what at that time he might have told us with some show of +reason) that our concerns in India were matters of delicacy, that to +divulge anything relative to them would be mischievous to the state. He +did not tell us that those who would inquire into his proceedings were +disposed to dismember the empire. He had not the presumption to say, +that, for his part, having obtained, in his Indian presidency, the +ultimate object of his ambition, his honor was concerned in executing +with integrity the trust which had been legally committed to his charge: +that others, not having been so fortunate, could not be so +disinterested; and therefore their accusations could spring from no +other source than faction, and envy to his fortune.</p> + +<p>Had he been frontless enough to hold such vain, vaporing language in the +face of a grave, a detailed, a specified matter of accusation, whilst he +violently resisted everything which could bring the merits of his cause +to the test,—had he been wild enough to anticipate the absurdities of +this day,—that is, had he inferred, as his late accuser has thought +proper to do, that he could not have been guilty of malversation in +office, for this sole and curious reason, that he had been in +office,—had he argued the impossibility of his abusing his power on +this sole principle, that <a name="Page_13" id="Page_13" title="13" class="pagenum"></a>he had power to abuse,—he would have left +but one impression on the mind of every man who heard him, and who +believed him in his senses: that in the utmost extent he was guilty of +the charge.</p> + +<p>But, Sir, leaving these two gentlemen to alternate as criminal and +accuser upon what principles they think expedient, it is for us to +consider whether the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Treasurer of +the Navy, acting as a Board of Control, are justified by law or policy +in suspending the legal arrangements made by the Court of Directors, in +order to transfer the public revenues to the private emolument of +certain servants of the East India Company, without the inquiry into the +origin and justice of their claims prescribed by an act of Parliament.</p> + +<p>It is not contended that the act of Parliament did not expressly ordain +an inquiry. It is not asserted that this inquiry was not, with equal +precision of terms, specially committed, under particular regulations, +to the Court of Directors. I conceive, therefore, the Board of Control +had no right whatsoever to intermeddle in that business. There is +nothing certain in the principles of jurisprudence, if this be not +undeniably true, that when, a special authority is given to any persons +by name to do some particular act, that no others, by virtue of general +powers, can obtain a legal title to intrude themselves into that trust, +and to exercise those special functions in their place. I therefore +consider the intermeddling of ministers in this affair as a downright +usurpation. But if the strained construction by which they have forced +themselves into a suspicious office (which every man delicate with +regard to character would rather have sought constructions to avoid) +were perfectly sound and <a name="Page_14" id="Page_14" title="14" class="pagenum"></a>perfectly legal, of this I am certain, that +they cannot be justified in declining the inquiry which had been +prescribed to the Court of Directors. If the Board of Control did +lawfully possess the right of executing the special trust given to that +court, they must take it as they found it, subject to the very same +regulations which bound the Court of Directors. It will be allowed that +the Court of Directors had no authority to dispense with either the +substance or the mode of inquiry prescribed by the act of Parliament. If +they had not, where in the act did the Board of Control acquire that +capacity? Indeed, it was impossible they should acquire it. What must we +think of the fabric and texture of an act of Parliament which should +find it necessary to prescribe a strict inquisition, that should descend +into minute regulations for the conduct of that inquisition, that should +commit this trust to a particular description of men, and in the very +same breath should enable another body, at their own pleasure, to +supersede all the provisions the legislature had made, and to defeat the +whole purpose, end, and object of the law? This cannot be supposed even +of an act of Parliament conceived by the ministers themselves, and +brought forth during the delirium of the last session.</p> + +<p>My honorable friend has told you in the speech which introduced his +motion, that fortunately this question is not a great deal involved in +the labyrinths of Indian detail. Certainly not. But if it were, I beg +leave to assure you that there is nothing in the Indian detail which is +more difficult than in the detail of any other business. I admit, +because I have some experience of the fact, that for the interior +regulation of India a minute knowledge of India <a name="Page_15" id="Page_15" title="15" class="pagenum"></a>is requisite. But on +any specific matter of delinquency in its government you are as capable +of judging as if the same thing were done at your door. Fraud, +injustice, oppression, peculation, engendered in India, are crimes of +the same blood, family, and cast with those that are born and bred in +England. To go no farther than the case before us: you are just as +competent to judge whether the sum of four millions sterling ought or +ought not to be passed from the public treasury into a private pocket +without any title except the claim of the parties, when the issue of +fact is laid in Madras, as when it is laid in Westminster. Terms of art, +indeed, are different in different places; but they are generally +understood in none. The technical style of an Indian treasury is not one +jot more remote than the jargon of our own Exchequer from the train of +our ordinary ideas or the idiom of our common language. The difference, +therefore, in the two cases is not in the comparative difficulty or +facility of the two subjects, but in our attention to the one and our +total neglect of the other. Had this attention and neglect been +regulated by the value of the several objects, there would be nothing to +complain of. But the reverse of that supposition is true. The scene of +the Indian abuse is distant, indeed; but we must not infer that the +value of our interest in it is decreased in proportion as it recedes +from our view. In our politics, as in our common conduct, we shall be +worse than infants, if we do not put our senses under the tuition of our +judgment, and effectually cure ourselves of that optical illusion which +makes a brier at our nose of greater magnitude than an oak at five +hundred yards' distance.<a name="Page_16" id="Page_16" title="16" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>I think I can trace all the calamities of this country to the single +source of our not having had steadily before our eyes a general, +comprehensive, well-connected, and well-proportioned view of the whole +of our dominions, and a just sense of their true bearings and relations. +After all its reductions, the British empire is still vast and various. +After all the reductions of the House of Commons, (stripped as we are of +our brightest ornaments and of our most important privileges,) enough +are yet left to furnish us, if we please, with means of showing to the +world that we deserve the superintendence of as large an empire as this +kingdom ever held, and the continuance of as ample privileges as the +House of Commons, in the plenitude of its power, had been habituated to +assert. But if we make ourselves too little for the sphere of our duty, +if, on the contrary, we do not stretch and expand our minds to the +compass of their object, be well assured that everything about us will +dwindle by degrees, until at length our concerns are shrunk to the +dimensions of our minds. It is not a predilection to mean, sordid, +home-bred cares that will avert the consequences of a false estimation +of our interest, or prevent the shameful dilapidation into which a great +empire must fall by mean reparations upon mighty ruins.</p> + +<p>I confess I feel a degree of disgust, almost leading to despair, at the +manner in which we are acting in the great exigencies of our country. +There is now a bill in this House appointing a rigid inquisition into +the minutest detail of our offices at home. The collection of sixteen +millions annually, a collection on which the public greatness, safety, +and credit have their reliance, the whole order of criminal +jurispru<a name="Page_17" id="Page_17" title="17" class="pagenum"></a>dence, which holds together society itself, have at no time +obliged us to call forth such powers,—no, nor anything like them. There +is not a principle of the law and Constitution of this country that is +not subverted to favor the execution of that project.<a name="FNanchor_3_3" id="FNanchor_3_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_3_3" class="fnanchor" title=" Appendix, No. 1.">[3]</a> And for what is +all this apparatus of bustle and terror? Is it because anything +substantial is expected from it? No. The stir and bustle itself is the +end proposed. The eye-servants of a short-sighted master will employ +themselves, not on what is most essential to his affairs, but on what is +nearest to his ken. Great difficulties have given a just value to +economy; and our minister of the day must be an economist, whatever it +may cost us. But where is he to exert his talents? At home, to be sure; +for where else can he obtain a profitable credit for their exertion? It +is nothing to him, whether the object on which he works under our eye be +promising or not. If he does not obtain any public benefit, he may make +regulations without end. Those are sure to pay in present expectation, +whilst the effect is at a distance, and may be the concern of other +times and other men. On these principles, he chooses to suppose (for he +does not pretend more than to suppose) a naked possibility that he shall +draw some resource out of crumbs dropped from the trenchers of penury; +that something shall be laid in store from the short allowance of +revenue-officers overloaded with duty and famished for want of +bread,—by a reduction from officers who are at this very hour ready to +batter the Treasury with what breaks through stone walls for an +<i>increase</i> of their appointments. From the marrowless bones of these +skeleton <a name="Page_18" id="Page_18" title="18" class="pagenum"></a>establishments, by the use of every sort of cutting and of +every sort of fretting tool, he flatters himself that he may chip and +rasp an empirical alimentary powder, to diet into some similitude of +health and substance the languishing chimeras of fraudulent reformation.</p> + +<p>Whilst he is thus employed according to his policy and to his taste, he +has not leisure to inquire into those abuses in India that are drawing +off money by millions from the treasures of this country, which are +exhausting the vital juices from members of the state, where the public +inanition is far more sorely felt than in the local exchequer of +England. Not content with winking at these abuses, whilst he attempts to +squeeze the laborious, ill-paid drudges of English revenue, he lavishes, +in one act of corrupt prodigality, upon those who never served the +public in any honest occupation at all, an annual income equal to two +thirds of the whole collection of the revenues of this kingdom.</p> + +<p>Actuated by the same principle of choice, he has now on the anvil +another scheme, full of difficulty and desperate hazard, which totally +alters the commercial relation of two kingdoms, and, what end soever it +shall have, may bequeath a legacy of heartburning and discontent to one +of the countries, perhaps to both, to be perpetuated to the latest +posterity. This project is also undertaken on the hope of profit. It is +provided, that, out of some (I know not what) remains of the Irish +hereditary revenue, a fund, at some time, and of some sort, should be +applied to the protection of the Irish trade. Here we are commanded +again to task our faith, and to persuade ourselves, that, out of the +surplus of deficiency, out of <a name="Page_19" id="Page_19" title="19" class="pagenum"></a>the savings of habitual and systematic +prodigality, the minister of wonders will provide support for this +nation, sinking under the mountainous load of two hundred and thirty +millions of debt. But whilst we look with pain at his desperate and +laborious trifling, whilst we are apprehensive that he will break his +back in stooping to pick up chaff and straws, he recovers himself at an +elastic bound, and with a broadcast swing of his arm he squanders over +his Indian field a sum far greater than the clear produce of the whole +hereditary revenue of the kingdom of Ireland.<a name="FNanchor_4_4" id="FNanchor_4_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_4_4" class="fnanchor" title=" The whole of the net Irish hereditary revenue is, on a +medium of the last seven years, about 330,000_l._ yearly. The revenues +of all denominations fall short more than 150,000_l._ yearly of the +charges. On the _present_ produce, if Mr. Pitt's scheme was to take +place, he might gain from seven to ten thousand pounds a year.">[4]</a></p> + +<p>Strange as this scheme of conduct in ministry is, and inconsistent with +all just policy, it is still true to itself, and faithful to its own +perverted order. Those who are bountiful to crimes will be rigid to +merit and penurious to service. Their penury is even held out as a blind +and cover to their prodigality. The economy of injustice is to furnish +resources for the fund of corruption. Then they pay off their protection +to great crimes and great criminals by being inexorable to the paltry +frailties of little men; and these modern flagellants are sure, with a +rigid fidelity, to whip their own enormities on the vicarious back of +every small offender.</p> + +<p>It is to draw your attention to economy of quite another order, it is to +animadvert on offences of a far different description, that my honorable +friend has brought before you the motion of this day. It is to +perpetuate the abuses which are subverting the fabric <a name="Page_20" id="Page_20" title="20" class="pagenum"></a>of your empire, +that the motion is opposed. It is, therefore, with reason (and if he has +power to carry himself through, I commend his prudence) that the right +honorable gentleman makes his stand at the very outset, and boldly +refuses all Parliamentary information. Let him admit but one step +towards inquiry, and he is undone. You must be ignorant, or he cannot be +safe. But before his curtain is let down, and the shades of eternal +night shall veil our Eastern dominions from our view, permit me, Sir, to +avail myself of the means which were furnished in anxious and +inquisitive times to demonstrate out of this single act of the present +minister what advantages you are to derive from permitting the greatest +concern of this nation to be separated from the cognizance, and exempted +even out of the competence, of Parliament. The greatest body of your +revenue, your most numerous armies, your most important commerce, the +richest sources of your public credit, (contrary to every idea of the +known, settled policy of England,) are on the point of being converted +into a mystery of state. You are going to have one half of the globe hid +even from the common liberal curiosity of an English gentleman. Here a +grand revolution commences. Mark the period, and mark the circumstances. +In most of the capital changes that are recorded in the principles and +system of any government, a public benefit of some kind or other has +been pretended. The revolution commenced in something plausible, in +something which carried the appearance at least of punishment of +delinquency or correction of abuse. But here, in the very moment of the +conversion of a department of British government into an Indian mystery, +and in the very act in <a name="Page_21" id="Page_21" title="21" class="pagenum"></a>which the change commences, a corrupt private +interest is set up in direct opposition to the necessities of the +nation. A diversion is made of millions of the public money from the +public treasury to a private purse. It is not into secret negotiations +for war, peace, or alliance that the House of Commons is forbidden to +inquire. It is a matter of account; it is a pecuniary transaction; it is +the demand of a suspected steward upon ruined tenants and an embarrassed +master that the Commons of Great Britain are commanded not to inspect. +The whole tenor of the right honorable gentleman's argument is consonant +to the nature of his policy. The system of concealment is fostered by a +system of falsehood. False facts, false colors, false names of persons +and things, are its whole support.</p> + +<p>Sir, I mean to follow the right honorable gentleman over that field of +deception, clearing what he has purposely obscured, and fairly stating +what it was necessary for him to misrepresent. For this purpose, it is +necessary you should know, with some degree of distinctness, a little of +the locality, the nature, the circumstances, the magnitude of the +pretended debts on which this marvellous donation is founded, as well as +of the persons from whom and by whom it is claimed.</p> + +<p>Madras, with its dependencies, is the second (but with a long interval, +the second) member of the British empire in the East. The trade of that +city, and of the adjacent territory, was not very long ago among the +most flourishing in Asia. But since the establishment of the British +power it has wasted away under an uniform gradual decline, insomuch that +in the year 1779 not one merchant of eminence <a name="Page_22" id="Page_22" title="22" class="pagenum"></a>was to be found in the +whole country.<a name="FNanchor_5_5" id="FNanchor_5_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_5_5" class="fnanchor" title=" Mr. Smith's Examination before the Select Committee. +Appendix, No. 2.">[5]</a> During this period of decay, about six hundred +thousand sterling pounds a year have been drawn off by English gentlemen +on their private account, by the way of China alone.<a name="FNanchor_6_6" id="FNanchor_6_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_6_6" class="fnanchor" title=" Appendix, No. 2.">[6]</a> If we add four +hundred thousand, as probably remitted through other channels, and in +other mediums, that is, in jewels, gold, and silver, directly brought to +Europe, and in bills upon the British and foreign companies, you will +scarcely think the matter overrated. If we fix the commencement of this +extraction of money from the Carnatic at a period no earlier than the +year 1760, and close it in the year 1780, it probably will not amount to +a great deal less than twenty millions of money.</p> + +<p>During the deep, silent flow of this steady stream of wealth which set +from India into Europe, it generally passed on with no adequate +observation; but happening at some periods to meet rifts of rocks that +checked its course, it grew more noisy and attracted more notice. The +pecuniary discussions caused by an accumulation of part of the fortunes +of their servants in a debt from the Nabob of Arcot was the first thing +which very particularly called for, and long engaged, the attention of +the Court of Directors. This debt amounted to eight hundred and eighty +thousand pounds sterling, and was claimed, for the greater part, by +English gentlemen residing at Madras. This grand capital, settled at +length by order at ten per cent, afforded an annuity of eighty-eight +thousand pounds.<a name="FNanchor_7_7" id="FNanchor_7_7"></a><a href="#Footnote_7_7" class="fnanchor" title=" Fourth Report, Mr. Dundas's Committee, p. 4.">[7]</a></p> + +<p>Whilst the Directors were digesting their astonish<a name="Page_23" id="Page_23" title="23" class="pagenum"></a>ment at this +information, a memorial was presented to them from three gentlemen, +informing them that their friends had lent, likewise, to merchants of +Canton in China, a sum of not more than one million sterling. In this +memorial they called upon the Company for their assistance and +interposition with the Chinese government for the recovery of the debt. +This sum lent to Chinese merchants was at twenty-four per cent, which +would yield, if paid, an annuity of two hundred and forty thousand +pounds.<a name="FNanchor_8_8" id="FNanchor_8_8"></a><a href="#Footnote_8_8" class="fnanchor" title=" A witness examined before the Committee of Secrecy says +that eighteen per cent was the usual interest, but he had heard that +more had been given. The above is the account which Mr. B. received.">[8]</a></p> + +<p>Perplexed as the Directors were with these demands, you may conceive, +Sir, that they did not find themselves very much disembarrassed by being +made acquainted that they must again exert their influence for a new +reserve of the happy parsimony of their servants, collected into a +second debt from the Nabob of Arcot, amounting to two millions four +hundred thousand pounds, settled at an interest of twelve per cent. This +is known by the name of the Consolidation of 1777, as the former of the +Nabob's debts was by the title of the Consolidation of 1767. To this was +added, in a separate parcel, a little reserve, called the Cavalry Debt, +of one hundred and sixty thousand pounds, at the same interest. The +whole of these four capitals, amounting to four millions four hundred +and forty thousand pounds, produced at their several rates, annuities +amounting to six hundred and twenty-three thousand pounds a year: a good +deal more than one third of the clear land-tax of England, at four +shillings in the pound; a good deal more than double the whole annual +dividend of the East India<a name="Page_24" id="Page_24" title="24" class="pagenum"></a> Company, the nominal masters to the +proprietors in these funds. Of this interest, three hundred and +eighty-three thousand two hundred pounds a year stood chargeable on the +public revenues of the Carnatic.</p> + +<p>Sir, at this moment, it will not be necessary to consider the various +operations which the capital and interest of this debt have successively +undergone. I shall speak to these operations when I come particularly to +answer the right honorable gentleman on each of the heads, as he has +thought proper to divide them. But this was the exact view in which +these debts first appeared to the Court of Directors, and to the world. +It varied afterwards. But it never appeared in any other than a most +questionable shape. When this gigantic phantom of debt first appeared +before a young minister, it naturally would have justified some degree +of doubt and apprehension. Such a prodigy would have filled any common +man with superstitious fears. He would exorcise that shapeless, nameless +form, and by everything sacred would have adjured it to tell by what +means a small number of slight individuals, of no consequence or +situation, possessed of no lucrative offices, without the command of +armies or the known administration of revenues, without profession of +any kind, without any sort of trade sufficient to employ a peddler, +could have, in a few years, (as to some, even in a few months,) amassed +treasures equal to the revenues of a respectable kingdom? Was it not +enough to put these gentlemen, in the novitiate of their administration, +on their guard, and to call upon them for a strict inquiry, (if not to +justify them in a reprobation of those demands without any inquiry at +all,) that, when all<a name="Page_25" id="Page_25" title="25" class="pagenum"></a> England, Scotland, and Ireland had for years been +witness to the immense sums laid out by the servants of the Company in +stocks of all denominations, in the purchase of lands, in the buying and +building of houses, in the securing quiet seats in Parliament or in the +tumultuous riot of contested elections, in wandering throughout the +whole range of those variegated modes of inventive prodigality which +sometimes have excited our wonder, sometimes roused our indignation, +that, after all, India was four millions still in debt to <i>them</i>? India +in debt to <i>them</i>! For what? Every debt, for which an equivalent of some +kind or other is not given, is, on the face of it, a fraud. What is the +equivalent they have given? What equivalent had they to give? What are +the articles of commerce, or the branches of manufacture, which those +gentlemen have carried hence to enrich India? What are the sciences they +beamed out to enlighten it? What are the arts they introduced to cheer +and to adorn it? What are the religious, what the moral institutions +they have taught among that people, as a guide to life, or as a +consolation when life is to be no more, that there is an eternal debt, a +debt "still paying, still to owe," which must be bound on the present +generation in India, and entailed on their mortgaged posterity forever? +A debt of millions, in favor of a set of men whose names, with few +exceptions, are either buried in the obscurity of their origin and +talents or dragged into light by the enormity of their crimes!</p> + +<p>In my opinion the courage of the minister was the most wonderful part of +the transaction, especially as he must have read, or rather the right +honorable gentleman says he has read for him, whole volumes <a name="Page_26" id="Page_26" title="26" class="pagenum"></a>upon the +subject. The volumes, by the way, are not by one tenth part so numerous +as the right honorable gentleman has thought proper to pretend, in order +to frighten you from inquiry; but in these volumes, such as they are, +the minister must have found a full authority for a suspicion (at the +very least) of everything relative to the great fortunes made at Madras. +What is that authority? Why, no other than the standing authority for +all the claims which the ministry has thought fit to provide for,—the +grand debtor,—the Nabob of Arcot himself. Hear that prince, in the +letter written to the Court of Directors, at the precise period whilst +the main body of these debts were contracting. In his letter he states +himself to be, what undoubtedly he is, a most competent witness to this +point. After speaking of the war with Hyder Ali in 1768 and 1769, and of +other measures which he censures, (whether right or wrong it signifies +nothing,) and into which he says he had been led by the Company's +servants, he proceeds in this manner:—"If all these things were against +the real interests of the Company, they are ten thousand times more +against mine, and against the prosperity of my country and the happiness +of my people; for your interests and mine are the same. <i>What were they +owing to, then? To the private views of a few individuals, who have +enriched themselves at the expense of your influence and of my country: +for your servants HAVE NO TRADE IN THIS COUNTRY, neither do you pay them +high wages; yet in a few years they return to England with many lacs of +pagodas. How can you or I account for such immense fortunes acquired in +so short a time, without any visible means of getting them?</i>"<a name="Page_27" id="Page_27" title="27" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>When he asked this question, which involves its answer, it is +extraordinary that curiosity did not prompt the Chancellor of the +Exchequer to that inquiry which might come in vain recommended to him by +his own act of Parliament. Does not the Nabob of Arcot tell us, in so +many words, that there was no fair way of making the enormous sums sent +by the Company's servants to England? And do you imagine that there was +or could be more honesty and good faith in the demands for what remained +behind in India? Of what nature were the transactions with himself? If +you follow the train of his information, you must see, that, if these +great sums were at all lent, it was not property, but spoil, that was +lent; if not lent, the transaction was not a contract, but a fraud. +Either way, if light enough could not be furnished to authorize a full +condemnation of these demands, they ought to have been left to the +parties, who best knew and understood each other's proceedings. It was +not necessary that the authority of government should interpose in favor +of claims whose very foundation was a defiance of that authority, and +whose object and end was its entire subversion.</p> + +<p>It may be said that this letter was written by the Nabob of Arcot in a +moody humor, under the influence of some chagrin. Certainly it was; but +it is in such humors that truth comes out. And when he tells you, from +his own knowledge, what every one must presume, from the extreme +probability of the thing, whether he told it or not, one such testimony +is worth a thousand that contradict that probability, when the parties +have a better understanding with each other, and when they have a point +to carry that may unite them in a common deceit.<a name="Page_28" id="Page_28" title="28" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>If this body of private claims of debt, real or devised, were a +question, as it is falsely pretended, between the Nabob of Arcot, as +debtor, and Paul Benfield and his associates, as creditors, I am sure I +should give myself but little trouble about it. If the hoards of +oppression were the fund for satisfying the claims of bribery and +peculation, who would wish to interfere between such litigants? If the +demands were confined to what might be drawn from the treasures which +the Company's records uniformly assert that the Nabob is in possession +of, or if he had mines of gold or silver or diamonds, (as we know that +he has none,) these gentlemen might break open his hoards or dig in his +mines without any disturbance from me. But the gentlemen on the other +side of the House know as well as I do, and they dare not contradict me, +that the Nabob of Arcot and his creditors are not adversaries, but +collusive parties, and that the whole transaction is under a false color +and false names. The litigation is not, nor ever has been, between their +rapacity and his hoarded riches. No: it is between him and them +combining and confederating, on one side, and the public revenues, and +the miserable inhabitants of a ruined country, on the other. These are +the real plaintiffs and the real defendants in the suit. Refusing a +shilling from his hoards for the satisfaction of any demand, the Nabob +of Arcot is always ready, nay, he earnestly, and with eagerness and +passion, contends for delivering up to these pretended creditors his +territory and his subjects. It is, therefore, not from treasuries and +mines, but from the food of your unpaid armies, from the blood withheld +from the veins and whipped out of the backs of the most miserable of +men, that we are to <a name="Page_29" id="Page_29" title="29" class="pagenum"></a>pamper extortion, usury, and peculation, under the +false names of debtors and creditors of state.</p> + +<p>The great patron of these creditors, (to whose honor they ought to erect +statues,) the right honorable gentleman,<a name="FNanchor_9_9" id="FNanchor_9_9"></a><a href="#Footnote_9_9" class="fnanchor" title=" Mr. Dundas.">[9]</a> in stating the merits which +recommended them to his favor, has ranked them under three grand +divisions. The first, the creditors of 1767; then the creditors of the +cavalry loan; and lastly, the creditors of the loan in 1777. Let us +examine them, one by one, as they pass in review before us.</p> + +<p>The first of these loans, that of 1767, he insists, has an indisputable +claim upon the public justice. The creditors, he affirms, lent their +money publicly; they advanced it with the express knowledge and +approbation of the Company; and it was contracted at the moderate +interest of ten per cent. In this loan, the demand is, according to him, +not only just, but meritorious in a very high degree: and one would be +inclined to believe he thought so, because he has put it last in the +provision he has made for these claims.</p> + +<p>I readily admit this debt to stand the fairest of the whole; for, +whatever may be my suspicions concerning a part of it, I can convict it +of nothing worse than the most enormous usury. But I can convict, upon +the spot, the right honorable gentleman of the most daring +misrepresentation in every one fact, without any exception, that he has +alleged in defence of this loan, and of his own conduct with regard to +it. I will show you that this debt was never contracted with the +knowledge of the Company; that it had not their approbation; that they +received the first intelligence of it with the utmost possible surprise, +indignation, and alarm.<a name="Page_30" id="Page_30" title="30" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>So for from being previously apprised of the transaction from its +origin, it was two years before the Court of Directors obtained any +official intelligence of it. "The dealings of the servants with the +Nabob were concealed from the first, until they were found out" (says +Mr. Sayer, the Company's counsel) "by the report of the country." The +Presidency, however, at last thought proper to send an official account. +On this the Directors tell them, "To your great reproach, it has been +<i>concealed from us</i>. We cannot but suspect this debt to have had its +weight in <i>your proposed aggrandizement of Mahomed Ali</i> [the Nabob of +Arcot]; but whether it has or has not, certain it is you are guilty of +an high breach of duty in <i>concealing</i> it from us."</p> + +<p>These expressions, concerning the ground of the transaction, its effect, +and its clandestine nature, are in the letters bearing date March 17, +1769. After receiving a more full account, on the 23d March, 1770, they +state, that "Messrs. John Pybus, John Call, and James Bourchier, as +trustees for themselves and others of the Nabob's private creditors, had +proved a deed of assignment upon the Nabob and his son of FIFTEEN +districts of the Nabob's country, the revenues of which yielded, in time +of peace, eight lacs of pagodas [320,000<i>l.</i> sterling] annually; and +likewise an assignment of the yearly tribute paid the Nabob from the +Rajah of Tanjore, amounting to four lacs of rupees [40,000<i>l.</i>]." The +territorial revenue at that time possessed by these gentlemen, without +the knowledge or consent of their masters, amounted to three hundred and +sixty thousand pounds sterling annually. They were making rapid strides +to the entire possession of the country, when the Directors, whom the +<a name="Page_31" id="Page_31" title="31" class="pagenum"></a>right honorable gentleman states as having authorized these +proceedings, were kept in such profound ignorance of this royal +acquisition of territorial revenue by their servants, that in the same +letter they say, "This assignment was obtained by <i>three of the members +of your board</i> in January, 1767; yet we do not find the <i>least trace</i> of +it upon your Consultations until August, 1768, nor do any of your +letters to us afford any information relative to such transactions till +the 1st of November, 1768. By your last letters of the 8th of May, 1769, +you bring the whole proceedings to light in one view."</p> + +<p>As to the previous knowledge of the Company, and its sanction to the +debts, you see that this assertion of that knowledge is utterly +unfounded. But did the Directors approve of it, and ratify the +transaction, when it was known? The very reverse. On the same 3d of +March, the Directors declare, "upon an <i>impartial examination</i> of the +whole conduct of our late Governor and Council of Fort George [Madras], +and on the fullest consideration, that the said Governor and Council +have, <i>in notorious violation of the trust</i> reposed in them, manifestly +<i>preferred the interest of private individuals to that of the Company</i>, +in permitting the assignment of the revenues of certain valuable +districts, to a very large amount, from the Nabob to individuals"; and +then, highly aggravating their crimes, they add,—"We order and direct +that you do examine, in the most impartial manner, all the +above-mentioned transactions, and that you <i>punish</i>, by suspension, +degradation, dismission, or otherwise, as to you shall seem meet, all +and every such servant or servants of the Company who may by you be +found guilty of any of the above offences." "We had" (say <a name="Page_32" id="Page_32" title="32" class="pagenum"></a>the +Directors) "the mortification to find that the servants of the Company, +who had been <i>raised, supported, and owed their present opulence to the +advantages</i> gained in such service, have in this instance most +<i>unfaithfully betrayed</i> their trust, <i>abandoned</i> the Company's interest, +and <i>prostituted</i> its influence to accomplish the <i>purposes of +individuals, whilst the interest of the Company is almost wholly +neglected</i>, and payment to us rendered extremely precarious." Here, +then, is the rock of approbation of the Court of Directors, on which the +right honorable gentleman says this debt was founded. Any member, Mr. +Speaker, who should come into the House, on my reading this sentence of +condemnation of the Court of Directors against their unfaithful +servants, might well imagine that he had heard an harsh, severe, +unqualified invective against the present ministerial Board of Control. +So exactly do the proceedings of the patrons of this abuse tally with +those of the actors in it, that the expressions used in the condemnation +of the one may serve for the reprobation of the other, without the +change of a word.</p> + +<p>To read you all the expressions of wrath and indignation fulminated in +this dispatch against the meritorious creditors of the right honorable +gentleman, who according to him have been so fully approved by the +Company, would be to read the whole.</p> + +<p>The right honorable gentleman, with an address peculiar to himself, +every now and then slides in the Presidency of Madras, as synonymous to +the Company. That the Presidency did approve the debt is certain. But +the right honorable gentleman, as prudent in suppressing as skilful in +bringing forward his matter, has not chosen to tell you that the +Presidency were <a name="Page_33" id="Page_33" title="33" class="pagenum"></a>the very persons guilty of contracting this +loan,—creditors themselves, and agents and trustees for all the other +creditors. For this the Court of Directors accuse them of breach of +trust; and for this the right honorable gentleman considers them as +perfectly good authority for those claims. It is pleasant to hear a +gentleman of the law quote the approbation of creditors as an authority +for their own debt.</p> + +<p>How they came to contract the debt to themselves, how they came to act +as agents for those whom they ought to have controlled, is for your +inquiry. The policy of this debt was announced to the Court of Directors +by the very persons concerned in creating it. "Till very lately," say +the Presidency, "the Nabob placed his dependence on the Company. Now he +has been taught by ill advisers that an interest out of doors may stand +him in good stead. He has been made to believe that <i>his private +creditors have power and interest to overrule the Court of +Directors</i>."<a name="FNanchor_10_10" id="FNanchor_10_10"></a><a href="#Footnote_10_10" class="fnanchor" title=" For the threats of the creditors, and total subversion of +the authority of the Company in favor of the Nabob's power and the +increase thereby of his evil dispositions, and the great derangement of +all public concerns, see Select Committee Fort St. George's letters, +21st November, 1769, and January 31st, 1770; September 11, 1772; and +Governor Bourchier's letters to the Nabob of Arcot, 21st November, 1769, +and December 9th, 1769.">[10]</a> The Nabob was not misinformed. The private creditors +instantly qualified a vast number of votes; and having made themselves +masters of the Court of Proprietors, as well as extending a powerful +cabal in other places as important, they so completely overturned the +authority of the Court of Directors at home and abroad, that this poor, +baffled government was soon obliged to lower its tone. It was glad to be +admitted into partnership with its own servants. The<a name="Page_34" id="Page_34" title="34" class="pagenum"></a> Court of +Directors, establishing the debt which they had reprobated as a breach +of trust, and which was planned for the subversion of their authority, +settled its payments on a par with those of the public; and even so were +not able to obtain peace, or even equality in their demands. All the +consequences lay in a regular and irresistible train. By employing their +influence for the recovery of this debt, their orders, issued in the +same breath, against creating new debts, only animated the strong +desires of their servants to this prohibited prolific sport, and it soon +produced a swarm of sons and daughters, not in the least degenerated +from the virtue of their parents.</p> + +<p>From that moment the authority of the Court of Directors expired in the +Carnatic, and everywhere else. "Every man," says the Presidency, "who +opposes the government and its measures, finds an immediate countenance +from the Nabob; even our discarded officers, however unworthy, are +received into the Nabob's service."<a name="FNanchor_11_11" id="FNanchor_11_11"></a><a href="#Footnote_11_11" class="fnanchor" title=" "He [the Nabob] is in a great degree the cause of our +present inability, by diverting the revenues of the Carnatic through +_private channels_." "Even this peshcush [the Tanjore tribute], +circumstanced as he and we are, he has assigned over to others, _who now +set themselves in opposition to the Company_."—Consultations, October +11, 1769, on the 12th communicated to the Nabob.">[11]</a> It was, indeed, a matter of no +wonderful sagacity to determine whether the Court of Directors, with +their miserable salaries to their servants, of four or five hundred +pounds a year, or the distributor of millions, was most likely to be +obeyed. It was an invention beyond the imagination of all the +speculatists of our speculating age, to see a government quietly settled +in one and the same town, composed of two distinct members: one to pay +<a name="Page_35" id="Page_35" title="35" class="pagenum"></a>scantily for obedience, and the other to bribe high for rebellion and +revolt.</p> + +<p>The next thing which recommends this particular debt to the right +honorable gentleman is, it seems, the moderate interest of ten per cent. +It would be lost labor to observe on this assertion. The Nabob, in a +long apologetic letter<a name="FNanchor_12_12" id="FNanchor_12_12"></a><a href="#Footnote_12_12" class="fnanchor" title=" Nabob's letter to Governor Palk. Papers published by the +Directors in 1775; and papers printed by the same authority, 1781.">[12]</a> for the transaction between him and the body +of the creditors, states the fact as I shall state it to you. In the +accumulation of this debt, the first interest paid was from thirty to +thirty-six per cent; it was then brought down to twenty-five per cent; +at length it was reduced to twenty; and there it found its rest. During +the whole process, as often as any of these monstrous interests fell +into an arrear, (into which they were continually falling,) the arrear, +formed into a new capital,<a name="FNanchor_13_13" id="FNanchor_13_13"></a><a href="#Footnote_13_13" class="fnanchor" title=" See papers printed by order of a General Court in 1780, +pp. 222 and 224; as also Nabob's letter to Governor Dupré, 19th July, +1771: "I have taken up loans by which I have suffered a loss of _upwards +of a crore of pagodas_ [four millions sterling] _by interest on an heavy +interest_." Letter 15th January, 1772: "Notwithstanding I have taken +much trouble, and have made many payments to my creditors, yet the load +of my debt, _which became so great by interest and compound interest_, +is not cleared."">[13]</a> was added to the old, and the same +interest of twenty per cent accrued upon both. The Company, having got +some scent of the enormous usury which prevailed at Madras, thought it +necessary to interfere, and to order all interests to be lowered to ten +per cent. This order, which contained no exception, though it by no +means pointed particularly to this class of debts, came like a +thunderclap on the Nabob. He considered his political credit as ruined; +but to <a name="Page_36" id="Page_36" title="36" class="pagenum"></a>find a remedy to this unexpected evil, he again added to the old +principal twenty per cent interest accruing for the last year. Thus a +new fund was formed; and it was on that accumulation of various +principals, and interests heaped upon interests, not on the sum +originally lent, as the right honorable gentleman would make you +believe, that ten per cent was settled on the whole.</p> + +<p>When you consider the enormity of the interest at which these debts were +contracted, and the several interests added to the principal, I believe +you will not think me so skeptical, if I should doubt whether for this +debt of 880,000<i>l.</i> the Nabob ever saw 100,000<i>l.</i> in real money. The +right honorable gentleman suspecting, with all his absolute dominion +over fact, that he never will be able to defend even this venerable +patriarchal job, though sanctified by its numerous issue, and hoary with +prescriptive years, has recourse to recrimination, the last resource of +guilt. He says that this loan of 1767 was provided for in Mr. Fox's +India bill; and judging of others by his own nature and principles, he +more than insinuates that this provision was made, not from any sense of +merit in the claim, but from partiality to General Smith, a proprietor, +and an agent for that debt. If partiality could have had any weight +against justice and policy with the then ministers and their friends, +General Smith had titles to it. But the right honorable gentleman knows +as well as I do, that General Smith was very far from looking on himself +as partially treated in the arrangements of that time; indeed, what man +dared to hope for private partiality in that sacred plan for relief to +nations?</p> + +<p>It is not necessary that the right honorable gentle<a name="Page_37" id="Page_37" title="37" class="pagenum"></a>man should +sarcastically call that time to our recollection. Well do I remember +every circumstance of that memorable period. God forbid I should forget +it! O illustrious disgrace! O victorious defeat! May your memorial be +fresh and new to the latest generations! May the day of that generous +conflict be stamped in characters never to be cancelled or worn out from +the records of time! Let no man hear of us, who shall not hear, that, in +a struggle against the intrigues of courts and the perfidious levity of +the multitude, we fell in the cause of honor, in the cause of our +country, in the cause of human nature itself! But if fortune should be +as powerful over fame as she has been prevalent over virtue, at least +our conscience is beyond her jurisdiction. My poor share in the support +of that great measure no man shall ravish from me. It shall be safely +lodged in the sanctuary of my heart,—never, never to be torn from +thence, but with those holds that grapple it to life.</p> + +<p>I say, I well remember that bill, and every one of its honest and its +wise provisions. It is not true that this debt was ever protected or +enforced, or any revenue whatsoever set apart for it. It was left in +that bill just where it stood: to be paid or not to be paid out of the +Nabob's private treasures, according to his own discretion. The Company +had actually given it their sanction, though always relying for its +validity on the sole security of the faith of him<a name="FNanchor_14_14" id="FNanchor_14_14"></a><a href="#Footnote_14_14" class="fnanchor" title=" The Nabob of Arcot.">[14]</a> who without their +knowledge or consent entered into the original obligation. It had no +other sanction; it ought to have had no other. So far was Mr. Fox's bill +from providing <i>funds</i> for it, as this ministry have wickedly done for +this, and for ten times worse transactions, out of the <a name="Page_38" id="Page_38" title="38" class="pagenum"></a>public estate, +that an express clause immediately preceded, positively forbidding any +British subject from receiving assignments upon any part of the +territorial revenue, on any pretence whatsoever.<a name="FNanchor_15_15" id="FNanchor_15_15"></a><a href="#Footnote_15_15" class="fnanchor" title=" Appendix, No. 3.">[15]</a></p> + +<p>You recollect, Mr. Speaker, that the Chancellor of the Exchequer +strongly professed to retain every part of Mr. Fox's bill which was +intended to prevent abuse; but in <i>his</i> India bill, which (let me do +justice) is as able and skilful a performance, for its own purposes, as +ever issued from the wit of man, premeditating this iniquity,—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Hoc ipsum ut strueret, Trojamque aperiret Achivis,—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>expunged this essential clause, broke down the fence which was raised to +cover the public property against the rapacity of his partisans, and +thus levelling every obstruction, he made a firm, broad highway for sin +and death, for usury and oppression, to renew their ravages throughout +the devoted revenues of the Carnatic.</p> + +<p>The tenor, the policy, and the consequences of this debt of 1767 are in +the eyes of ministry so excellent, that its merits are irresistible; and +it takes the lead to give credit and countenance to all the rest. Along +with this chosen body of heavy-armed infantry, and to support it in the +line, the right honorable gentleman has stationed his corps of black +cavalry. If there be any advantage between this debt and that of 1769, +according to him the cavalry debt has it. It is not a subject of +defence: it is a theme of panegyric. Listen to the right honorable +gentleman, and you will find it was contracted to save the country,—to +prevent mutiny in armies,—to introduce economy <a name="Page_39" id="Page_39" title="39" class="pagenum"></a>in revenues; and for +all these honorable purposes, it originated at the express desire and by +the representative authority of the Company itself.</p> + +<p>First let me say a word to the authority. This debt was contracted, not +by the authority of the Company, not by its representatives, (as the +right honorable gentleman has the unparalleled confidence to assert,) +but in the ever-memorable period of 1777, by the usurped power of those +who rebelliously, in conjunction with the Nabob of Arcot, had overturned +the lawful government of Madras. For that rebellion this House +unanimously directed a public prosecution. The delinquents, after they +had subverted government, in order to make to themselves a party to +support them in their power, are universally known to have dealt jobs +about to the right and to the left, and to any who were willing to +receive them. This usurpation, which the right honorable gentleman well +knows was brought about by and for the great mass of these pretended +debts, is the authority which is set up by him to represent the +Company,—to represent that Company which, from the first moment of +their hearing of this corrupt and fraudulent transaction to this hour, +have uniformly disowned and disavowed it.</p> + +<p>So much for the authority. As to the facts, partly true, and partly +colorable, as they stand recorded, they are in substance these. The +Nabob of Arcot, as soon as he had thrown off the superiority of this +country by means of these creditors, kept up a great army which he never +paid. Of course his soldiers were generally in a state of mutiny.<a name="FNanchor_16_16" id="FNanchor_16_16"></a><a href="#Footnote_16_16" class="fnanchor" title=" See Mr. Dundas's 1st, 2d, and 3d Reports.">[16]</a> +The usurping Council say that they labored hard with their master, <a name="Page_40" id="Page_40" title="40" class="pagenum"></a>the +Nabob, to persuade him to reduce these mutinous and useless troops. He +consented; but, as usual, pleaded inability to pay them their arrears. +Here was a difficulty. The Nabob had no money; the Company had no money; +every public supply was empty. But there was one resource which no +season has ever yet dried up in that climate. The <i>soucars</i> were at +hand: that is, private English money-jobbers offered their assistance. +Messieurs Taylor, Majendie, and Call proposed to advance the small sum +of 160,000<i>l.</i> to pay off the Nabob's black cavalry, provided the +Company's authority was given for their loan. This was the great point +of policy always aimed at, and pursued through a hundred devices by the +servants at Madras. The Presidency, who themselves had no authority for +the functions they presumed to exercise, very readily gave the sanction +of the Company to those servants who knew that the Company, whose +sanction was demanded, had positively prohibited all such transactions.</p> + +<p>However, so far as the reality of the dealing goes, all is hitherto fair +and plausible; and here the right honorable gentleman concludes, with +commendable prudence, his account of the business. But here it is I +shall beg leave to commence my supplement: for the gentleman's discreet +modesty has led him to cut the thread of the story somewhat abruptly. +One of the most essential parties is quite forgotten. Why should the +episode of the poor Nabob be omitted? When that prince chooses it, +nobody can tell his story better. Excuse me, if I apply again to my +book, and give it you from the first hand: from the Nabob himself.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Stratton became acquainted with this, and <a name="Page_41" id="Page_41" title="41" class="pagenum"></a>got Mr. Taylor and +others to lend me four lacs of pagodas towards discharging the arrears +of pay of my troops. Upon this, I wrote a letter of thanks to Mr. +Stratton; and upon the faith of this money being paid immediately, I +ordered many of my troops to be discharged by a certain day, and +lessened the number of my servants. Mr. Taylor, &c., some time after +acquainted me, that they had no ready money, but they would grant teeps +payable in four months. This astonished me; for I did not know what +might happen, when the sepoys were dismissed from my service. I begged +of Mr. Taylor and the others to pay this sum to the officers of my +regiments at the time they mentioned; and desired the officers, at the +same time, to pacify and persuade the men belonging to them that their +pay would be given to them <i>at the end of four months</i>, and that, till +those arrears were discharged, their pay should be continued to them. +<i>Two years</i> are nearly expired since that time, but Mr. Taylor has not +yet entirely discharged the arrears of those troops, and I am obliged to +continue their pay from that time till this. I hoped to have been able, +by this expedient, to have lessened the number of my troops, and +discharged the arrears due to them, considering the trifle of interest +to Mr. Taylor and the others as no great matter; but instead of this, <i>I +am oppressed with the burden of pay due to those troops, and the +interest, which is going on to Mr. Taylor from the day the teeps were +granted to him</i>." What I have read to you is an extract of a letter from +the Nabob of the Carnatic to Governor Rumbold, dated the 22d, and +received the 24th of March, 1779.<a name="FNanchor_17_17" id="FNanchor_17_17"></a><a href="#Footnote_17_17" class="fnanchor" title=" See further Consultations, 3d February, 1778.">[17]</a></p> + +<p>Suppose his Highness not to be well broken in to <a name="Page_42" id="Page_42" title="42" class="pagenum"></a>things of this kind, +it must, indeed, surprise so known and established a bond-vender as the +Nabob of Arcot, one who keeps himself the largest bond-warehouse in the +world, to find that he was now to receive in kind: not to take money for +his obligations, but to give his bond in exchange for the bond of +Messieurs Taylor, Majendie, and Call, and to pay, besides, a good, smart +interest, legally twelve per cent, (in reality, perhaps, twenty or +twenty-four per cent,) for this exchange of paper. But his troops were +not to be so paid, or so disbanded. They wanted bread, and could not +live by cutting and shuffling of bonds. The Nabob still kept the troops +in service, and was obliged to continue, as you have seen, the whole +expense to exonerate himself from which he became indebted to the +soucars.</p> + +<p>Had it stood here, the transaction would have been of the most audacious +strain of fraud and usury perhaps ever before discovered, whatever might +have been practised and concealed. But the same authority (I mean the +Nabob's) brings before you something, if possible, more striking. He +states, that, for this their paper, he immediately handed over to these +gentlemen something very different from paper,—that is, the receipt of +a territorial revenue, of which, it seems, they continued as long in +possession as the Nabob himself continued in possession of anything. +Their payments, therefore, not being to commence before the end of four +months, and not being completed in two years, it must be presumed +(unless they prove the contrary) that their payments to the Nabob were +made out of the revenues they had received from his assignment. Thus +they condescended to accumulate a debt of 160,000<i>l.</i> with an interest +of twelve per <a name="Page_43" id="Page_43" title="43" class="pagenum"></a>cent, in compensation for a lingering payment to the +Nabob of 160,000<i>l.</i> of his own money.</p> + +<p>Still we have not the whole. About two years after the assignment of +those territorial revenues to these gentlemen, the Nabob receives a +remonstrance from his chief manager in a principal province, of which +this is the tenor. "The <i>entire</i> revenue of those districts is by your +Highness's order set apart to discharge the tunkaws [assignments] +granted to the Europeans. The gomastahs [agents] of Mr. Taylor to Mr. De +Fries are there in order to collect those tunkaws; and as they receive +<i>all</i> the revenue that is collected, your Highness's troops have <i>seven +or eight months' pay due</i>, which they cannot receive, and are thereby +reduced to the greatest <i>distress</i>. <i>In such times</i> it is highly +necessary to provide for the sustenance of the troops, that they may be +ready to exert themselves in the service of your Highness."</p> + +<p>Here, Sir, you see how these causes and effects act upon one another. +One body of troops mutinies for want of pay; a debt is contracted to pay +them; and they still remain unpaid. A territory destined to pay other +troops is assigned for this debt; and these other troops fall into the +same state of indigence and mutiny with the first. Bond is paid by bond; +arrear is turned into new arrear; usury engenders new usury; mutiny, +suspended in one quarter, starts up in another; until all the revenues +and all the establishments are entangled into one inextricable knot of +confusion, from which they are only disengaged by being entirely +destroyed. In that state of confusion, in a very few months after the +date of the memorial I have just read to you, things were found, when +the Nabob's troops, famished to feed English soucars, instead of +<a name="Page_44" id="Page_44" title="44" class="pagenum"></a>defending the country, joined the invaders, and deserted in entire +bodies to Hyder Ali.<a name="FNanchor_18_18" id="FNanchor_18_18"></a><a href="#Footnote_18_18" class="fnanchor" title=" Mr. Dundas's 1st Report, pp. 26, 29, and Appendix, No. 2, +10, 18, for the mutinous state and desertion of the Nabob's troops for +want of pay. See also Report IV. of the same committee.">[18]</a></p> + +<p>The manner in which this transaction was carried on shows that good +examples are not easily forgot, especially by those who are bred in a +great school. One of those splendid examples give me leave to mention, +at a somewhat more early period; because one fraud furnishes light to +the discovery of another, and so on, until the whole secret of +mysterious iniquity bursts upon you in a blaze of detection. The paper I +shall read you is not on record. If you please, you may take it on my +word. It is a letter written from one of undoubted information in Madras +to Sir John Clavering, describing the practice that prevailed there, +whilst the Company's allies were under sale, during the time of Governor +Winch's administration.</p> + +<p>"One mode," says Clavering's correspondent, "of amassing money at the +Nabob's cost is curious. He is generally in arrears to the Company. Here +the Governor, being cash-keeper, is generally on good terms with the +banker, who manages matters thus. The Governor presses the Nabob for the +balance due from him; the Nabob flies to his banker for relief; the +banker engages to pay the money, and grants his notes accordingly, which +he puts in the cash-book as ready money; the Nabob pays him an interest +for it at two and three per cent <i>per mensem</i>, till the tunkaws he +grants on the particular districts for it are paid. Matters in the mean +time are so managed that there is no call for this money for the +Company's service <a name="Page_45" id="Page_45" title="45" class="pagenum"></a>till the tunkaws become due. By this means not a cash +is advanced by the banker, though he receives a heavy interest from the +Nabob, which is divided as lawful spoil."</p> + +<p>Here, Mr. Speaker, you have the whole art and mystery, the true +free-mason secret, of the profession of <i>soucaring</i>; by which a few +innocent, inexperienced young Englishmen, such as Mr. Paul Benfield, for +instance, without property upon which any one would lend to themselves a +single shilling, are enabled at once to take provinces in mortgage, to +make princes their debtors, and to become creditors for millions.</p> + +<p>But it seems the right honorable gentleman's favorite soucar cavalry +have proved the payment before the Mayor's Court at Madras! Have they +so? Why, then, defraud our anxiety and their characters of that proof? +Is it not enough that the charges which I have laid before you have +stood on record against these poor injured gentlemen for eight years? Is +it not enough that they are in print by the orders of the East India +Company for five years? After these gentlemen have borne all the odium +of this publication and all the indignation of the Directors with such +unexampled equanimity, now that they are at length stimulated into +feeling are you to deny them their just relief? But will the right +honorable gentleman be pleased to tell us how they came not to give this +satisfaction to the Court of Directors, their lawful masters, during all +the eight years of this litigated claim? Were they not bound, by every +tie that can bind man, to give them this satisfaction? This day, for the +first time, we hear of the proofs. But when were these proofs offered? +In what cause? Who were the parties? Who inspected, who contested this +<a name="Page_46" id="Page_46" title="46" class="pagenum"></a>belated account? Let us see something to oppose to the body of record +which appears against them. The Mayor's Court! the Mayor's Court! +Pleasant! Does not the honorable gentleman know that the first corps of +creditors (the creditors of 1767) stated it as a sort of hardship to +them, that they could not have justice at Madras, from the impossibility +of their supporting their claims in the Mayor's Court? Why? Because, say +they, the members of that court were themselves creditors, and therefore +could not sit as judges.<a name="FNanchor_19_19" id="FNanchor_19_19"></a><a href="#Footnote_19_19" class="fnanchor" title=" Memorial from the creditors to the Governor and Council, +22d January, 1770.">[19]</a> Are we ripe to say that no creditor under +similar circumstances was member of the court, when the payment which is +the ground of this cavalry debt was put in proof?<a name="FNanchor_20_20" id="FNanchor_20_20"></a><a href="#Footnote_20_20" class="fnanchor" title=" In the year 1778, Mr. James Call, one of the proprietors +of this specific debt, was actually mayor. (Appendix to 2d Report of Mr. +Dundas's committee, No. 65.) The only proof which appeared on the +inquiry instituted in the General Court of 1781 was an affidavit of _the +lenders themselves_, deposing (what nobody ever denied) that they had +_engaged_ and _agreed_ to pay—not that they _had_ paid—the sum of +160,000_l._ This was two years after the transaction; and the affidavit +is made before George Proctor, mayor, an attorney for certain of the old +creditors.—Proceedings of the President and Council of Fort St. George, +22d February, 1779.">[20]</a> Nay, are we not in +a manner compelled to conclude that the court was so constituted, when +we know there is scarcely a man in Madras who has not some participation +in these transactions? It is a shame to hear such proofs mentioned, +instead of the honest, vigorous scrutiny which the circumstances of such +an affair so indispensably call for.</p> + +<p>But his Majesty's ministers, indulgent enough to other scrutinies, have +not been satisfied with author<a name="Page_47" id="Page_47" title="47" class="pagenum"></a>izing the payment of this demand without +such inquiry as the act has prescribed; but they have added the arrear +of twelve per cent interest, from the year 1777 to the year 1784, to +make a new capital, raising thereby 160 to 294,000<i>l.</i> Then they charge +a new twelve per cent on the whole from that period, for a transaction +in which it will be a miracle if a single penny will be ever found +really advanced from the private stock of the pretended creditors.</p> + +<p>In this manner, and at such an interest, the ministers have thought +proper to dispose of 294,000<i>l.</i> of the public revenues, for what is +called the Cavalry Loan. After dispatching this, the right honorable +gentleman leads to battle his last grand division, the consolidated debt +of 1777. But having exhausted all his panegyric on the two first, he has +nothing at all to say in favor of the last. On the contrary, he admits +that it was contracted in defiance of the Company's orders, without even +the pretended sanction of any pretended representatives. Nobody, indeed, +has yet been found hardy enough to stand forth avowedly in its defence. +But it is little to the credit of the age, that what has not +plausibility enough to find an advocate has influence enough to obtain a +protector. Could any man expect to find that protector anywhere? But +what must every man think, when he finds that protector in the chairman +of the Committee of Secrecy<a name="FNanchor_21_21" id="FNanchor_21_21"></a><a href="#Footnote_21_21" class="fnanchor" title=" Right Honorable Henry Dundas.">[21]</a>, who had published to the House, and to +the world, the facts that condemn these debts, the orders that forbid +the incurring of them, the dreadful consequences which attended them? +Even in his official letter, when he tramples on his Parliamentary +report, yet his general language is the same. Read the pref<a name="Page_48" id="Page_48" title="48" class="pagenum"></a>ace to this +part of the ministerial arrangement, and you would imagine that this +debt was to be crushed, with all the weight of indignation which could +fall from a vigilant guardian of the public treasury upon those who +attempted to rob it. What must be felt by every man who has feeling, +when, after such a thundering preamble of condemnation, this debt is +ordered to be paid without any sort of inquiry into its +authenticity,—without a single step taken to settle even the amount of +the demand,—without an attempt so much as to ascertain the real persons +claiming a sum which rises in the accounts from one million three +hundred thousand pound sterling to two million four hundred thousand +pound, principal money,<a name="FNanchor_22_22" id="FNanchor_22_22"></a><a href="#Footnote_22_22" class="fnanchor" title=" Appendix to the 4th Report of Mr. Dundas's committee, No +15.">[22]</a>—without an attempt made to ascertain the +proprietors, of whom no list has ever yet been laid before the Court of +Directors,—of proprietors who are known to be in a collusive shuffle, +by which they never appear to be the same in any two lists handed about +for their own particular purposes?</p> + +<p>My honorable friend who made you the motion has sufficiently exposed the +nature of this debt. He has stated to you, that <i>its own agents</i>, in the +year 1781, in the arrangement <i>they proposed</i> to make at Calcutta, were +satisfied to have twenty-five per cent at once struck off from the +capital of a great part of this debt, and prayed to have a provision +made for this reduced principal, without any interest at all. This was +an arrangement of <i>their own</i>, an arrangement made by those who best +knew the true constitution of their own debt, who knew how little favor +it merited,<a name="FNanchor_23_23" id="FNanchor_23_23"></a><a href="#Footnote_23_23" class="fnanchor" title=" "No sense of the common danger, in case of a war, can +prevail on him [the Nabob of Arcot] to furnish the Company with what is +absolutely necessary to assemble an army, though it is beyond a doubt +that money to a large amount is now hoarded up in his coffers at +Chepauk; and tunkaws are granted to _individuals_, upon some of his most +_valuable countries_, for payment of part of those debts which he has +contracted, and _which certainly will not bear inspection, as neither +debtor nor creditors have ever had the confidence to submit the accounts +to our examination_, though they expressed a wish to consolidate the +debts under the auspices of this government, agreeably to a plan they +had formed."—Madras Consultations, 20th July, 1778. Mr. Dundas's +Appendix to 2nd Report, 143. See also last Appendix to ditto Report, No. +376, B.">[23]</a> and how little hopes they had to find any <a name="Page_49" id="Page_49" title="49" class="pagenum"></a>persons in +authority abandoned enough to support it as it stood.</p> + +<p>But what corrupt men, in the fond imaginations of a sanguine avarice, +had not the confidence to propose, they have found a Chancellor of the +Exchequer in England hardy enough to undertake for them. He has cheered +their drooping spirits. He has thanked the peculators for not despairing +of their commonwealth. He has told them they were too modest. He has +replaced the twenty-five per cent which, in order to lighten themselves, +they had abandoned in their conscious terror. Instead of cutting off the +interest, as they had themselves consented to do, with the fourth of the +capital, he has added the whole growth of four years' usury of twelve +per cent to the first overgrown principal; and has again grafted on this +meliorated stock a perpetual annuity of six per cent, to take place from +the year 1781. Let no man hereafter talk of the decaying energies of +Nature. All the acts and monuments in the records of peculation, the +consolidated corruption of ages, the patterns of exemplary plunder in +the heroic times of Roman iniquity, never equalled the gigantic +corruption of this single act. Never did Nero, in all the insolent +<a name="Page_50" id="Page_50" title="50" class="pagenum"></a>prodigality of despotism, deal out to his prætorian guards a donation +fit to be named with the largess showered down by the bounty of our +Chancellor of the Exchequer on the faithful band of his Indian sepoys.</p> + +<p>The right honorable gentleman<a name="FNanchor_24_24" id="FNanchor_24_24"></a><a href="#Footnote_24_24" class="fnanchor" title=" Transcriber's note: Footnote missing in original text.">[24]</a> lets you freely and voluntarily into +the whole transaction. So perfectly has his conduct confounded his +understanding, that he fairly tells you that through the course of the +whole business he has never conferred with any but the agents of the +pretended creditors. After this, do you want more to establish a secret +understanding with the parties,—to fix, beyond a doubt, their collusion +and participation in a common fraud?</p> + +<p>If this were not enough, he has furnished you with other presumptions +that are not to be shaken. It is one of the known indications of guilt +to stagger and prevaricate in a story, and to vary in the motives that +are assigned to conduct. Try these ministers by this rule. In their +official dispatch, they tell the Presidency of Madras that they have +established the debt for two reasons: first, because the Nabob (the +party indebted) does not dispute it; secondly, because it is mischievous +to keep it longer afloat, and that the payment of the European creditors +will promote circulation in the country. These two motives (for the +plainest reasons in the world) the right honorable gentleman has this +day thought fit totally to abandon. In the first place, he rejects the +authority of the Nabob of Arcot. It would, indeed, be pleasant to see +him adhere to this exploded testimony. He next, upon grounds equally +solid, abandons the <a name="Page_51" id="Page_51" title="51" class="pagenum"></a>benefits of that circulation which was to be +produced by drawing out all the juices of the body. Laying aside, or +forgetting, these pretences of his dispatch, he has just now assumed a +principle totally different, but to the full as extraordinary. He +proceeds upon a supposition that many of the claims may be fictitious. +He then finds, that, in a case where many valid and many fraudulent +claims are blended together, the best course for their discrimination is +indiscriminately to establish them all. He trusts, (I suppose,) as there +may not be a fund sufficient for every description of creditors, that +the best warranted claimants will exert themselves in bringing to light +those debts which will not bear an inquiry. What he will not do himself +he is persuaded will be done by others; and for this purpose he leaves +to any person a general power of excepting to the debt. This total +change of language and prevarication in principle is enough, if it stood +alone, to fix the presumption of unfair dealing. His dispatch assigns +motives of policy, concord, trade, and circulation: his speech proclaims +discord and litigations, and proposes, as the ultimate end, detection.</p> + +<p>But he may shift his reasons, and wind and turn as he will, confusion +waits him at all his doubles. Who will undertake this detection? Will +the Nabob? But the right honorable gentleman has himself this moment +told us that no prince of the country can by any motive be prevailed +upon to discover any fraud that is practised upon him by the Company's +servants. He says what (with the exception of the complaint against the +Cavalry Loan) all the world knows to be true: and without that prince's +concurrence, what evidence can be had of <a name="Page_52" id="Page_52" title="52" class="pagenum"></a>the fraud of any the smallest +of these demands? The ministers never authorized any person to enter +into his exchequer and to search his records. Why, then, this shameful +and insulting mockery of a pretended contest? Already contests for a +preference have arisen among these rival bond-creditors. Has not the +Company itself struggled for a preference for years, without any attempt +at detection of the nature of those debts with which they contended? +Well is the Nabob of Arcot attended to in the only specific complaint he +has ever made. He complained of unfair dealing in the Cavalry Loan. It +is fixed upon him with interest on interest; and this loan is excepted +from all power of litigation.</p> + +<p>This day, and not before, the right honorable gentleman thinks that the +general establishment of all claims is the surest way of laying open the +fraud of some of them. In India this is a reach of deep policy. But what +would be thought of this mode of acting on a demand upon the Treasury in +England? Instead of all this cunning, is there not one plain way +open,—that is, to put the burden of the proof on those who make the +demand? Ought not ministry to have said to the creditors, "The person +who admits your debt stands excepted to as evidence; he stands charged +as a collusive party, to hand over the public revenues to you for +sinister purposes. You say, you have a demand of some millions on the +Indian Treasury; prove that you have acted by lawful authority; prove, +at least, that your money has been <i>bonâ fide</i> advanced; entitle +yourself to my protection by the fairness and fulness of the +communications you make"? Did an honest creditor ever refuse that +reasonable and honest test?<a name="Page_53" id="Page_53" title="53" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>There is little doubt that several individuals have been seduced by the +purveyors to the Nabob of Arcot to put their money (perhaps the whole of +honest and laborious earnings) into their hands, and that at such high +interest as, being condemned at law, leaves them at the mercy of the +great managers whom they trusted. These seduced creditors are probably +persons of no power or interest either in England or India, and may be +just objects of compassion. By taking, in this arrangement, no measures +for discrimination and discovery, the fraudulent and the fair are in the +first instance confounded in one mass. The subsequent selection and +distribution is left to the Nabob. With him the agents and instruments +of his corruption, whom he sees to be omnipotent in England, and who may +serve him in future, as they have done in times past, will have +precedence, if not an exclusive preference. These leading interests +domineer, and have always domineered, over the whole. By this +arrangement, the persons seduced are made dependent on their seducers; +honesty (comparative honesty at least) must become of the party of +fraud, and must quit its proper character and its just claims, to +entitle itself to the alms of bribery and peculation.</p> + +<p>But be these English creditors what they may, the creditors most +certainly not fraudulent are the natives, who are numerous and wretched +indeed: by exhausting the whole revenues of the Carnatic, nothing is +left for them. They lent <i>bonâ fide</i>; in all probability they were even +forced to lend, or to give goods and service for the Nabob's +obligations. They had no trusts to carry to his market. They had no +faith of alliances to sell. They had no nations to betray to robbery and +ruin. They had no lawful government <a name="Page_54" id="Page_54" title="54" class="pagenum"></a>seditiously to overturn; nor had +they a governor, to whom it is owing that you exist in India, to deliver +over to captivity, and to death in a shameful prison.<a name="FNanchor_25_25" id="FNanchor_25_25"></a><a href="#Footnote_25_25" class="fnanchor" title=" Lord Pigot">[25]</a></p> + +<p>These were the merits of the principal part of the debt of 1777, and the +universally conceived causes of its growth; and thus the unhappy natives +are deprived of every hope of payment for their real debts, to make +provision for the arrears of unsatisfied bribery and treason. You see in +this instance that the presumption of guilt is not only no exception to +the demands on the public treasury, but with these ministers it is a +necessary condition to their support. But that you may not think this +preference solely owing to their known contempt of the natives, who +ought with every generous mind to claim their first charities, you will +find the same rule religiously observed with Europeans too. Attend, Sir, +to this decisive case. Since the beginning of the war, besides arrears +of every kind, a bond-debt has been contracted at Madras, uncertain in +its amount, but represented from four hundred thousand pound to a +million sterling. It stands only at the low interest of eight per cent. +Of the legal authority on which this debt was contracted, of its +purposes for the very being of the state, of its publicity and fairness, +no doubt has been entertained for a moment. For this debt no sort of +provision whatever has been made. It is rejected as an outcast, whilst +the whole undissipated attention of the minister has been employed for +the discharge of claims entitled to his favor by the merits we have +seen.</p> + +<p>I have endeavored to find out, if possible, the amount of the whole of +those demands, in order to <a name="Page_55" id="Page_55" title="55" class="pagenum"></a>see how much, supposing the country in a +condition to furnish the fund, may remain to satisfy the public debt and +the necessary establishments. But I have been foiled in my attempt.</p> + +<p>About one fourth, that is, about 220,000<i>l.</i>, of the loan of 1767 +remains unpaid. How much interest is in arrear I could never discover: +seven or eight years' at least, which would make the whole of that debt +about 396,000<i>l.</i> This stock, which the ministers in their instructions +to the Governor of Madras state as the least exceptionable, they have +thought proper to distinguish by a marked severity, leaving it the only +one on which the interest is not added to the principal to beget a new +interest.</p> + +<p>The Cavalry Loan, by the operation of the same authority, is made up to +294,000<i>l.</i>; and this 294,000<i>l.</i>, made up of principal and interest, is +crowned with a new interest of twelve per cent.</p> + +<p>What the grand loan, the bribery loan of 1777, may be is amongst the +deepest mysteries of state. It is probably the first debt ever assuming +the title of Consolidation that did not express what the amount of the +sum consolidated was. It is little less than a contradiction in terms. +In the debt of the year 1767 the sum was stated in the act of +consolidation, and made to amount to 880,000<i>l.</i> capital. When this +consolidation of 1777 was first announced at the Durbar, it was +represented authentically at 2,400,000<i>l.</i> In that, or rather in a +higher state, Sir Thomas Rumbold found and condemned it.<a name="FNanchor_26_26" id="FNanchor_26_26"></a><a href="#Footnote_26_26" class="fnanchor" title=" In Sir Thomas Rumbold's letter to the Court of Directors, +March 15th, 1778, he represents it as higher, in the following +manner:—"How shall I paint to you my astonishment, on my arrival here, +when I was informed, that, independent of this four lacs of pagodas [the +Cavalry Loan], independent of the Nabob's debt to his old creditors, and +the money due to the Company, he had contracted a debt to the enormous +amount of sixty-three lacs of pagodas [2,520,000_l._]. I mention this +circumstance to you _with horror_; for the creditors being in general +_servants of the Company_ renders my task, on the part of the Company, +_difficult and invidious_." "I have freed the sanction of this +government from so _corrupt_ a transaction. It is in my mind the most +venal of all proceedings to give the Company's protection to debts that +cannot bear the light; and though it appears exceedingly alarming, that +a country on which you are to depend for resources should be so involved +as to be nearly three years' revenue in debt,—in a country, too, where +one year's revenue can never be called _secure_, by men who know +anything of the politics of this part of India." "I think it proper to +mention to you, that, although _the Nabob reports his private debt to +amount to upwards of sixty lacs_, yet I understand that it is not quite +so much." Afterwards Sir Thomas Rumbold recommended this debt to the +favorable attention of the Company, but without any sufficient reason +for his change of disposition. However, he went no further.">[26]</a> It +afterwards fell <a name="Page_56" id="Page_56" title="56" class="pagenum"></a>into such a terror as to sweat away a million of its +weight at once; and it sunk to 1,400,000<i>l.</i><a name="FNanchor_27_27" id="FNanchor_27_27"></a><a href="#Footnote_27_27" class="fnanchor" title=" Nabob's proposals, November 25th, 1778; and memorial of +the creditors, March 1st, 1779.">[27]</a> However, it never was +without a resource for recruiting it to its old plumpness. There was a +sort of floating debt of about four or five hundred thousand pounds more +ready to be added, as occasion should require.</p> + +<p>In short, when you pressed this sensitive-plant, it always contracted +its dimensions. When the rude hand of inquiry was withdrawn, it expanded +in all the luxuriant vigor of its original vegetation. In the treaty of +1781, the whole of the Nabob's debt to private Europeans is by Mr. +Sulivan, agent to the Nabob and his creditors, stated at 2,800,000<i>l.</i>, +which, if the Cavalry Loan and the remains of the debt of 1767 be +subtracted, leaves it nearly at the amount originally declared at the +Durbar in 1777: but then <a name="Page_57" id="Page_57" title="57" class="pagenum"></a>there is a private instruction to Mr. Sulivan, +which, it seems, will reduce it again to the lower standard of +1,400,000<i>l.</i></p> + +<p>Failing in all my attempts, by a direct account, to ascertain the extent +of the capital claimed, (where in all probability no capital was ever +advanced,) I endeavored, if possible, to discover it by the interest +which was to be paid. For that purpose, I looked to the several +agreements for assigning the territories of the Carnatic to secure the +principal and interest of this debt. In one of them,<a name="FNanchor_28_28" id="FNanchor_28_28"></a><a href="#Footnote_28_28" class="fnanchor" title=" Nabob's proposals to his new consolidated creditors, +November 25th, 1778.">[28]</a> I found, in a +sort of postscript, by way of an additional remark, (not in the body of +the obligation,) the debt represented at 1,400,000<i>l.</i>: but when I +computed the sums to be paid for interest by instalments in another +paper, I found they produced an interest of two millions, at twelve per +cent; and the assignment supposed, that, if these instalments might +exceed, they might also fall short of, the real provision for that +interest.<a name="FNanchor_29_29" id="FNanchor_29_29"></a><a href="#Footnote_29_29" class="fnanchor" title=" Paper signed by the Nabob, 6th January, 1780.">[29]</a> Another instalment-bond was afterwards granted: in that +bond the interest exactly tallies with a capital of 1,400,000<i>l.</i>:<a name="FNanchor_30_30" id="FNanchor_30_30"></a><a href="#Footnote_30_30" class="fnanchor" title=" Kistbundi to July 31, 1780.">[30]</a> +but pursuing this capital through the correspondence, I lost sight of it +again, and it was asserted that this instalment-bond was considerably +short of the interest that ought to be computed to the time +mentioned.<a name="FNanchor_31_31" id="FNanchor_31_31"></a><a href="#Footnote_31_31" class="fnanchor" title=" Governor's letter to the Nabob, 25th July, 1779.">[31]</a></p> + +<p>Here are, therefore, two statements of equal authority, differing at +least a million from each other; and as neither persons claiming, nor +any special sum as belonging to each particular claimant, is ascertained +<a name="Page_58" id="Page_58" title="58" class="pagenum"></a>in the instruments of consolidation, or in the installment-bonds, a +large scope was left to throw in any sums for any persons, as their +merits in advancing the interest of that loan might require; a power was +also left for reduction, in case a harder hand, or more scanty funds, +might be found to require it. Stronger grounds for a presumption of +fraud never appeared in any transaction. But the ministers, faithful to +the plan of the interested persons, whom alone they thought fit to +confer with on this occasion, have ordered the payment of the whole mass +of these unknown, unliquidated sums, without an attempt to ascertain +them. On this conduct, Sir, I leave you to make your own reflections.</p> + +<p>It is impossible (at least I have found it impossible) to fix on the +real amount of the pretended debts with which your ministers have +thought proper to load the Carnatic. They are obscure; they shun +inquiry; they are enormous. That is all you know of them.</p> + +<p>That you may judge what chance any honorable and useful end of +government has for a provision that comes in for the leavings of these +gluttonous demands, I must take it on myself to bring before you the +real condition of that abused, insulted, racked, and ruined country; +though in truth my mind revolts from it, though you will hear it with +horror, and I confess I tremble when I think on these awful and +confounding dispensations of Providence. I shall first trouble you with +a few words as to the cause.</p> + +<p>The great fortunes made in India, in the beginnings of conquest, +naturally excited an emulation in all the parts and through the whole +succession <a name="Page_59" id="Page_59" title="59" class="pagenum"></a>of the Company's service. But in the Company it gave rise to +other sentiments. They did not find the new channels of acquisition flow +with equal riches to them. On the contrary, the high flood-tide of +private emolument was generally in the lowest ebb of their affairs. They +began also to fear that the fortune of war might take away what the +fortune of war had given. Wars were accordingly discouraged by repeated +injunctions and menaces: and that the servants might not be bribed into +them by the native princes, they were strictly forbidden to take any +money whatsoever from their hands. But vehement passion is ingenious in +resources. The Company's servants were not only stimulated, but better +instructed by the prohibition. They soon fell upon a contrivance which +answered their purposes far better than the methods which were +forbidden: though in this also they violated an ancient, but they +thought, an abrogated order. They reversed their proceedings. Instead of +receiving presents, they made loans. Instead of carrying on wars in +their own name, they contrived an authority, at once irresistible and +irresponsible, in whose name they might ravage at pleasure; and being +thus freed from all restraint, they indulged themselves in the most +extravagant speculations of plunder. The cabal of creditors who have +been the object of the late bountiful grant from his Majesty's +ministers, in order to possess themselves, under the name of creditors +and assignees, of every country in India, as fast as it should be +conquered, inspired into the mind of the Nabob of Arcot (then a +dependant on the Company of the humblest order) a scheme of the most +wild and desperate ambition that I believe ever was admitted into the +thoughts of a <a name="Page_60" id="Page_60" title="60" class="pagenum"></a>man so situated.<a name="FNanchor_32_32" id="FNanchor_32_32"></a><a href="#Footnote_32_32" class="fnanchor" title=" Report of the Select Committee, Madras Consultations, +January 7, 1771. See also papers published by the order of the Court of +Directors in 1776; and Lord Macartney's correspondence with Mr. Hastings +and the Nabob of Arcot. See also Mr. Dundas's Appendix, No 376, B. +Nabob's propositions through Mr. Sulivan and Assam Khân, Art. 6, and +indeed the whole.">[32]</a> First, they persuaded him to +consider himself as a principal member in the political system of +Europe. In the next place, they held out to him, and he readily imbibed, +the idea of the general empire of Hindostan. As a preliminary to this +undertaking, they prevailed on him to propose a tripartite division of +that vast country: one part to the Company; another to the Mahrattas; +and the third to himself. To himself he reserved all the southern part +of the great peninsula, comprehended under the general name of the +Deccan.</p> + +<p>On this scheme of their servants, the Company was to appear in the +Carnatic in no other light than as a contractor for the provision of +armies, and the hire of mercenaries for his use and under his direction. +This disposition was to be secured by the Nabob's putting himself under +the guaranty of France, and, by the means of that rival nation, +preventing the English forever from assuming an equality, much less a +superiority, in the Carnatic. In pursuance of this treasonable project, +(treasonable on the part of the English,) they extinguished the Company +as a sovereign power in that part of India; they withdrew the Company's +garrisons out of all the forts and strongholds of the Carnatic; they +declined to receive the ambassadors from foreign courts, and remitted +them to the Nabob of Arcot; they fell upon, and totally destroyed, the +oldest ally of the Company, the king of Tanjore, and plundered the +country to <a name="Page_61" id="Page_61" title="61" class="pagenum"></a>the amount of near five millions sterling; one after +another, in the Nabob's name, but with English force, they brought into +a miserable servitude all the princes and great independent nobility of +a vast country.<a name="FNanchor_33_33" id="FNanchor_33_33"></a><a href="#Footnote_33_33" class="fnanchor" title=" "The principal object of the expedition is, to get money +from Tanjore to pay the Nabob's debt: if a surplus, to be applied in +discharge of the Nabob's debts to his private creditors." +(Consultations, March 20, 1771; and for further lights, Consultations, +12th June, 1771.) "We are alarmed lest this debt to _individuals_ should +have been the _real_ motive for the aggrandizement of Mahomed Ali [the +Nabob of Arcot], and that _we are plunged into a war_ to put him in +possession of the Mysore revenues _for the discharge of the +debt_."—Letter from the Directors, March 17, 1769.">[33]</a> In proportion to these treasons and violences, which +ruined the people, the fund of the Nabob's debt grew and flourished.</p> + +<p>Among the victims to this magnificent plan of universal plunder, worthy +of the heroic avarice of the projectors, you have all heard (and he has +made himself to be well remembered) of an Indian chief called Hyder Ali +Khan. This man possessed the western, as the Company, under the name of +the Nabob of Arcot, does the eastern division of the Carnatic. It was +among the leading measures in the design of this cabal (according to +their own emphatic language) to <i>extirpate</i> this Hyder Ali.<a name="FNanchor_34_34" id="FNanchor_34_34"></a><a href="#Footnote_34_34" class="fnanchor" title=" Letter from the Nabob, May 1st, 1768; and ditto, 24th +April, 1770, 1st October; ditto, 16th September, 1772, 16th March, +1773.">[34]</a> They +declared the Nabob of Arcot to be his sovereign, and himself to be a +rebel, and publicly invested their instrument with the sovereignty of +the kingdom of Mysore. But their victim was not of the passive kind. +They were soon obliged to conclude a treaty of peace and close alliance +with this rebel, at the gates of Madras. Both before and since that +treaty, every principle of policy <a name="Page_62" id="Page_62" title="62" class="pagenum"></a>pointed out this power as a natural +alliance; and on his part it was courted by every sort of amicable +office. But the cabinet council of English creditors would not suffer +their Nabob of Arcot to sign the treaty, nor even to give to a prince at +least his equal the ordinary titles of respect and courtesy.<a name="FNanchor_35_35" id="FNanchor_35_35"></a><a href="#Footnote_35_35" class="fnanchor" title=" Letter from the Presidency at Madras to the Court of +Directors, 27th June, 1769.">[35]</a> From +that time forward, a continued plot was carried on within the divan, +black and white, of the Nabob of Arcot, for the destruction of Hyder +Ali. As to the outward members of the double, or rather treble +government of Madras, which had signed the treaty, they were always +prevented by some overruling influence (which they do not describe, but +which cannot be misunderstood) from performing what justice and interest +combined so evidently to enforce.<a name="FNanchor_36_36" id="FNanchor_36_36"></a><a href="#Footnote_36_36" class="fnanchor" title=" Mr. Dundas's committee. Report L, Appendix, No. 29.">[36]</a></p> + +<p>When at length Hyder Ali found that he had to do with men who either +would sign no convention, or whom no treaty and no signature could bind, +and who were the determined enemies of human intercourse itself, he +decreed to make the country possessed by these incorrigible and +predestinated criminals a memorable example to mankind. He resolved, in +the gloomy recesses of a mind capacious of such things, to leave the +whole Carnatic an everlasting monument of vengeance, and to put +perpetual desolation as a barrier between him and those against whom the +faith which holds the moral elements of the world together was no +protection. He became at length so confident of his force, so collected +in his might, that he made no secret whatsoever of his <a name="Page_63" id="Page_63" title="63" class="pagenum"></a>dreadful +resolution. Having terminated his disputes with every enemy and every +rival, who buried their mutual animosities in their common detestation +against the creditors of the Nabob of Arcot, he drew from every quarter +whatever a savage ferocity could add to his new rudiments in the arts of +destruction; and compounding all the materials of fury, havoc, and +desolation into one black cloud, he hung for a while on the declivities +of the mountains. Whilst the authors of all these evils were idly and +stupidly gazing on this menacing meteor, which blackened all their +horizon, it suddenly burst, and poured down the whole of its contents +upon the plains of the Carnatic. Then ensued a scene of woe, the like of +which no eye had seen, no heart conceived, and which no tongue can +adequately tell. All the horrors of war before known or heard of were +mercy to that new havoc. A storm of universal fire blasted every field, +consumed every house, destroyed every temple. The miserable inhabitants, +flying from their flaming villages, in part were slaughtered; others, +without regard to sex, to age, to the respect of rank or sacredness of +function, fathers torn from children, husbands from wives, enveloped in +a whirlwind of cavalry, and amidst the goading spears of drivers, and +the trampling of pursuing horses, were swept into captivity in an +unknown and hostile land. Those who were able to evade this tempest fled +to the walled cities; but escaping from fire, sword, and exile, they +fell into the jaws of famine.</p> + +<p>The alms of the settlement, in this dreadful exigency, were certainly +liberal; and all was done by charity that private charity could do: but +it was a <a name="Page_64" id="Page_64" title="64" class="pagenum"></a>people in beggary; it was a nation which stretched out its +hands for food. For months together, these creatures of sufferance, +whose very excess and luxury in their most plenteous days had fallen +short of the allowance of our austerest fasts, silent, patient, +resigned, without sedition or disturbance, almost without complaint, +perished by an hundred a day in the streets of Madras; every day seventy +at least laid their bodies in the streets or on the glacis of Tanjore, +and expired of famine in the granary of India. I was going to awake your +justice towards this unhappy part of our fellow-citizens, by bringing +before you some of the circumstances of this plague of hunger: of all +the calamities which beset and waylay the life of man, this comes the +nearest to our heart, and is that wherein the proudest of us all feels +himself to be nothing more than he is: but I find myself unable to +manage it with decorum; these details are of a species of horror so +nauseous and disgusting, they are so degrading to the sufferers and to +the hearers, they are so humiliating to human nature itself, that, on +better thoughts, I find it more advisable to throw a pall over this +hideous object, and to leave it to your general conceptions.</p> + +<p>For eighteen months,<a name="FNanchor_37_37" id="FNanchor_37_37"></a><a href="#Footnote_37_37" class="fnanchor" title=" Appendix, No. 4. Report of the Committee of Assigned +Revenue.">[37]</a> without intermission, this destruction raged +from the gates of Madras to the gates of Tanjore; and so completely did +these masters in their art, Hyder Ali and his more ferocious son, +absolve themselves of their impious vow, that, when the British armies +traversed, as they did, the Carnatic for hundreds of miles in all +directions, through the whole line of their march they did not see one +man, not one woman, not one child, not one <a name="Page_65" id="Page_65" title="65" class="pagenum"></a>four-footed beast of any +description whatever. One dead, uniform silence reigned over the whole +region. With the inconsiderable exceptions of the narrow vicinage of +some few forts, I wish to be understood as speaking literally. I mean to +produce to you more than three witnesses, above all exception, who will +support this assertion in its full extent. That hurricane of war passed +through every part of the central provinces of the Carnatic. Six or +seven districts to the north and to the south (and these not wholly +untouched) escaped the general ravage.</p> + +<p>The Carnatic is a country not much inferior in extent to England. Figure +to yourself, Mr. Speaker, the land in whose representative chair you +sit; figure to yourself the form and fashion of your sweet and cheerful +country from Thames to Trent, north and south, and from the Irish to the +German Sea, east and west, emptied and embowelled (may God avert the +omen of our crimes!) by so accomplished a desolation. Extend your +imagination a little further, and then suppose your ministers taking a +survey of this scene of waste and desolation. What would be your +thoughts, if you should be informed that they were computing how much +had been the amount of the excises, how much the customs, how much the +land and malt tax, in order that they should charge (take it in the most +favorable light) for public service, upon the relics of the satiated +vengeance of relentless enemies, the whole of what England had yielded +in the most exuberant seasons of peace and abundance? What would you +call it? To call it tyranny sublimed into madness would be too faint an +image; yet this very madness is the principle upon which the ministers +at your right hand have proceeded in their estimate of <a name="Page_66" id="Page_66" title="66" class="pagenum"></a>the revenues of +the Carnatic, when they were providing, not supply for the +establishments of its protection, but rewards for the authors of its +ruin.</p> + +<p>Every day you are fatigued and disgusted with this cant, "The Carnatic +is a country that will soon recover, and become instantly as prosperous +as ever." They think they are talking to innocents, who will believe, +that, by sowing of dragons' teeth, men may come up ready grown and ready +armed. They who will give themselves the trouble of considering (for it +requires no great reach of thought, no very profound knowledge) the +manner in which mankind are increased, and countries cultivated, will +regard all this raving as it ought to be regarded. In order that the +people, after a long period of vexation and plunder, may be in a +condition to maintain government, government must begin by maintaining +them. Here the road to economy lies not through receipt, but through +expense; and in that country Nature has given no short cut to your +object. Men must propagate, like other animals, by the mouth. Never did +oppression light the nuptial torch; never did extortion and usury spread +out the genial bed. Does any of you think that England, so wasted, +would, under such a nursing attendance, so rapidly and cheaply recover? +But he is meanly acquainted with either England or India who does not +know that England would a thousand times sooner resume population, +fertility, and what ought to be the ultimate secretion from both, +revenue, than such a country as the Carnatic.</p> + +<p>The Carnatic is not by the bounty of Nature a fertile soil. The general +size of its cattle is proof enough that it is much otherwise. It is some +days since I moved <a name="Page_67" id="Page_67" title="67" class="pagenum"></a>that a curious and interesting map, kept in the +India House, should be laid before you.<a name="FNanchor_38_38" id="FNanchor_38_38"></a><a href="#Footnote_38_38" class="fnanchor" title=" Mr. Barnard's map of the Jaghire">[38]</a> The India House is not yet +in readiness to send it; I have therefore brought down my own copy, and +there it lies for the use of any gentleman who may think such a matter +worthy of his attention. It is, indeed, a noble map, and of noble +things; but it is decisive against the golden dreams and sanguine +speculations of avarice run mad. In addition to what you know must be +the case in every part of the world, (the necessity of a previous +provision of habitation, seed, stock, capital,) that map will show you +that the uses of the influences of Heaven itself are in that country a +work of art. The Carnatic is refreshed by few or no living brooks or +running streams, and it has rain only at a season; but its product of +rice exacts the use of water subject to perpetual command. This is the +national bank of the Carnatic, on which it must have a perpetual credit, +or it perishes irretrievably. For that reason, in the happier times of +India, a number, almost incredible, of reservoirs have been made in +chosen places throughout the whole country: they are formed, for the +greater part, of mounds of earth and stones, with sluices of solid +masonry; the whole constructed with admirable skill and labor, and +maintained at a mighty charge. In the territory contained in that map +alone, I have been at the trouble of reckoning the reservoirs, and they +amount to upwards of eleven hundred, from the extent of two or three +acres to five miles in circuit. From these reservoirs currents are +occasionally drawn over the fields, and these watercourses again call +for a considerable expense to keep them properly scoured and duly +lev<a name="Page_68" id="Page_68" title="68" class="pagenum"></a>elled. Taking the district in that map as a measure, there cannot be +in the Carnatic and Tanjore fewer than ten thousand of these reservoirs +of the larger and middling dimensions, to say nothing of those for +domestic services, and the use of religious purification. These are not +the enterprises of your power, nor in a style of magnificence suited to +the taste of your minister. These are the monuments of real kings, who +were the fathers of their people,—testators to a posterity which they +embraced as their own. These are the grand sepulchres built by +ambition,—but by the ambition of an insatiable benevolence, which, not +contented with reigning in the dispensation of happiness during the +contracted term of human life, had strained, with all the reachings and +graspings of a vivacious mind, to extend the dominion of their bounty +beyond the limits of Nature, and to perpetuate themselves through +generations of generations, the guardians, the protectors, the +nourishers of mankind.</p> + +<p>Long before the late invasion, the persons who are objects of the grant +of public money now before you had so diverted the supply of the pious +funds of culture and population, that everywhere the reservoirs were +fallen into a miserable decay.<a name="FNanchor_39_39" id="FNanchor_39_39"></a><a href="#Footnote_39_39" class="fnanchor" title=" See Report IV., Mr. Dundas's committee, p. 46.">[39]</a> But after those domestic enemies had +provoked the entry of a cruel foreign foe into the country, he did not +leave it, until his revenge had completed the destruction begun by their +avarice. Few, very few indeed, of these magazines of water that are not +either totally destroyed, or cut through with such gaps as to require a +serious attention and much cost to reëstablish them, as the means of +present subsistence to the people and of future revenue to the state.<a name="Page_69" id="Page_69" title="69" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>What, Sir, would a virtuous and enlightened ministry do, on the view of +the ruins of such works before them?—on the view of such a chasm of +desolation as that which yawned in the midst of those countries, to the +north and south, which still bore some vestiges of cultivation? They +would have reduced all their most necessary establishments; they would +have suspended the justest payments; they would have employed every +shilling derived from the producing to reanimate the powers of the +unproductive parts. While they were performing this fundamental duty, +whilst they were celebrating these mysteries of justice and humanity, +they would have told the corps of fictitious creditors, whose crimes +were their claims, that they must keep an awful distance,—that they +must silence their inauspicious tongues,—that they must hold off their +profane, unhallowed paws from this holy work; they would have +proclaimed, with a voice that should make itself heard, that on every +country the first creditor is the plough,—that this original, +indefeasible claim supersedes every other demand.</p> + +<p>This is what a wise and virtuous ministry would have done and said. +This, therefore, is what our minister could never think of saying or +doing. A ministry of another kind would have first improved the country, +and have thus laid a solid foundation for future opulence and future +force. But on this grand point of the restoration of the country there +is not one syllable to be found in the correspondence of our ministers, +from the first to the last; they felt nothing for a land desolated by +fire, sword, and famine: their sympathies took another direction; they +were touched with pity for bribery, so long tormented with a fruitless +itching of its palms; their bowels yearned for <a name="Page_70" id="Page_70" title="70" class="pagenum"></a>usury, that had long +missed the harvest of its returning months;<a name="FNanchor_40_40" id="FNanchor_40_40"></a><a href="#Footnote_40_40" class="fnanchor" title=" Interest is rated in India by the month.">[40]</a> they felt for +peculation, which had been for so many years raking in the dust of an +empty treasury; they were melted into compassion for rapine and +oppression, licking their dry, parched, unbloody jaws. These were the +objects of their solicitude. These were the necessities for which they +were studious to provide.</p> + +<p>To state the country and its revenues in their real condition, and to +provide for those fictitious claims, consistently with the support of an +army and a civil establishment, would have been impossible; therefore +the ministers are silent on that head, and rest themselves on the +authority of Lord Macartney, who, in a letter to the Court of Directors, +written in the year 1781, speculating on what might be the result of a +wise management of the countries assigned by the Nabob of Arcot, rates +the revenue, as in time of peace, at twelve hundred thousand pounds a +year, as he does those of the king of Tanjore (which had not been +assigned) at four hundred and fifty. On this Lord Macartney grounds his +calculations, and on this they choose to ground theirs. It was on this +calculation that the ministry, in direct opposition to the remonstrances +of the Court of Directors, have compelled that miserable enslaved body +to put their hands to an order for appropriating the enormous sum of +480,000<i>l.</i> annually, as a fund for paying to their rebellious servants +a debt contracted in defiance of their clearest and most positive +injunctions.</p> + +<p>The authority and information of Lord Macartney is held high on this +occasion, though it is totally rejected in every other particular of +this business. I <a name="Page_71" id="Page_71" title="71" class="pagenum"></a>believe I have the honor of being almost as old an +acquaintance as any Lord Macartney has. A constant and unbroken +friendship has subsisted between us from a very early period; and I +trust he thinks, that, as I respect his character, and in general admire +his conduct, I am one of those who feel no common interest in his +reputation. Yet I do not hesitate wholly to disallow the calculation of +1781, without any apprehension that I shall appear to distrust his +veracity or his judgment. This peace estimate of revenue was not +grounded on the state of the Carnatic, as it then, or as it had +recently, stood. It was a statement of former and better times. There is +no doubt that a period did exist, when the large portion of the Carnatic +held by the Nabob of Arcot might be fairly reputed to produce a revenue +to that, or to a greater amount. But the whole had so melted away by the +slow and silent hostility of oppression and mismanagement, that the +revenues, sinking with the prosperity of the country, had fallen to +about 800,000<i>l.</i> a year, even before an enemy's horse had imprinted his +hoof on the soil of the Carnatic. From that view, and independently of +the decisive effects of the war which ensued, Sir Eyre Coote conceived +that years must pass before the country could be restored to its former +prosperity, and production. It was that state of revenue (namely, the +actual state before the war) which the Directors have opposed to Lord +Macartney's speculation. They refused to take the revenues for more than +800,000<i>l.</i> In this they are justified by Lord Macartney himself, who, +in a subsequent letter, informs the court that his sketch is a matter of +speculation; it supposes the country restored to its ancient prosperity, +and the revenue to be in a course of effect<a name="Page_72" id="Page_72" title="72" class="pagenum"></a>ive and honest collection. +If, therefore, the ministers have gone wrong, they were not deceived by +Lord Macartney: they were deceived by no man. The estimate of the +Directors is nearly the very estimate furnished by the right honorable +gentleman himself, and published to the world in one of the printed +reports of his own committee;<a name="FNanchor_41_41" id="FNanchor_41_41"></a><a href="#Footnote_41_41" class="fnanchor" title=" Mr. Dundas's committee. Rep. I. p. 9, and ditto, Rep. IV. +69, where the revenue of 1777 stated only at 22 lacs,—30 lacs stated as +the revenue, "_supposing_ the Carnatic to be _properly_ managed."">[41]</a> but as soon as he obtained his power, +he chose to abandon his account. No part of his official conduct can be +defended on the ground of his Parliamentary information.</p> + +<p>In this clashing of accounts and estimates, ought not the ministry, if +they wished to preserve even appearances, to have waited for information +of the actual result of these speculations, before they laid a charge, +and such a charge, not conditionally and eventually, but positively and +authoritatively, upon a country which they all knew, and which one of +them had registered on the records of this House, to be wasted, beyond +all example, by every oppression of an abusive government, and every +ravage of a desolating war? But that you may discern in what manner they +use the correspondence of office, and that thereby you may enter into +the true spirit of the ministerial Board of Control, I desire you, Mr. +Speaker, to remark, that, through their whole controversy with the Court +of Directors, they do not so much as hint at their ever having seen any +other paper from Lord Macartney, or any other estimate of revenue than +this of 1781. To this they hold. Here they take post; here they intrench +themselves.</p> + +<p>When I first read this curious controversy between <a name="Page_73" id="Page_73" title="73" class="pagenum"></a>the ministerial +board and the Court of Directors, common candor obliged me to attribute +their tenacious adherence to the estimate of 1781 to a total ignorance +of what had appeared upon the records. But the right honorable gentleman +has chosen to come forward with an uncalled-for declaration; he +boastingly tells you, that he has seen, read, digested, compared +everything,—and that, if he has sinned, he has sinned with his eyes +broad open. Since, then, the ministers will obstinately shut the gates +of mercy on themselves, let them add to their crimes what aggravations +they please. They have, then, (since it must be so,) wilfully and +corruptly suppressed the information which they ought to have produced, +and, for the support of peculation, have made themselves guilty of +spoliation and suppression of evidence.<a name="FNanchor_42_42" id="FNanchor_42_42"></a><a href="#Footnote_42_42" class="fnanchor" title=" See Appendix, No. 4. statement in the Report of the +Committee of Assigned Revenue.">[42]</a> The paper I hold in my hand, +which totally overturns (for the present, at least) the estimate of +1781, they have no more taken notice of, in their controversy with the +Court of Directors, than if it had no existence. It is the report made +by a committee appointed at Madras to manage the whole of the six +countries assigned to the Company by the Nabob of Arcot. This committee +was wisely instituted by Lord Macartney, to remove from himself the +suspicion of all improper management in so invidious a trust; and it +seems to have been well chosen. This committee has made a comparative +estimate of the only six districts which were in a condition to be let +to farm. In one set of columns they state the gross and net produce of +the districts as let by the Nabob. To that statement they oppose the +terms on <a name="Page_74" id="Page_74" title="74" class="pagenum"></a>which the same districts were rented for five years under +their authority. Under the Nabob, the gross farm was so high as +570,000<i>l.</i> sterling. What was the clear produce? Why, no more than +about 250,000<i>l.</i>; and this was the whole profit of the Nabob's +treasury, under his own management of all the districts which were in a +condition to be let to farm on the 27th of May, 1782. Lord Macartney's +leases stipulated a gross produce of no more than about 530,000<i>l.</i>; but +then the estimated net amount was nearly double the Nabob's. It, +however, did not then exceed 480,000<i>l.</i>; and Lord Macartney's +commissioners take credit for an annual revenue amounting to this clear +sum. Here is no speculation; here is no inaccurate account clandestinely +obtained from those who might wish, and were enabled, to deceive. It is +the authorized, recorded state of a real, recent transaction. Here is +not twelve hundred thousand pound,—not eight hundred. The whole revenue +of the Carnatic yielded no more, in May, 1782, than four hundred and +eighty thousand pounds: nearly the very precise sum which your minister, +who is so careful of the public security, has carried from all +descriptions of establishment to form a fund for the private emolument +of his creatures.</p> + +<p>In this estimate, we see, as I have just observed, the Nabob's farms +rated so high as 570,000<i>l.</i> Hitherto all is well: but follow on to the +effective net revenue; there the illusion vanishes; and you will not +find nearly so much as half the produce. It is with reason, therefore, +Lord Macartney invariably, throughout the whole correspondence, +qualifies all his views and expectations of revenue, and all his plans +for its application, with this indispensable condition, that the +<a name="Page_75" id="Page_75" title="75" class="pagenum"></a>management is not in the hands of the Nabob of Arcot. Should that fatal +measure take place, he has over and over again told you that he has no +prospect of realizing anything whatsoever for any public purpose. With +these weighty declarations, confirmed by such a state of indisputable +fact before them, what has been done by the Chancellor of the Exchequer +and his accomplices? Shall I be believed? They have delivered over those +very territories, on the keeping of which in the hands of the committee +the defence of our dominions, and, what was more dear to them, possibly, +their own job, depended,—they have delivered back again, without +condition, without arrangement, without stipulation of any sort for the +natives of any rank, the whole of those vast countries, to many of which +he had no just claim, into the ruinous mismanagement of the Nabob of +Arcot. To crown all, according to their miserable practice, whenever +they do anything transcendently absurd, they preface this their +abdication of their trust by a solemn declaration that they were not +obliged to it by any principle of policy or any demand of justice +whatsoever.</p> + +<p>I have stated to you the estimated produce of the territories of the +Carnatic in a condition to be farmed in 1782, according to the different +managements into which they might fall; and this estimate the ministers +have thought proper to suppress. Since that, two other accounts have +been received. The first informs us, that there has been a recovery of +what is called arrear, as well as of an improvement of the revenue of +one of the six provinces which were let in 1782.<a name="FNanchor_43_43" id="FNanchor_43_43"></a><a href="#Footnote_43_43" class="fnanchor" title=" The province of Tinnevelly.">[43]</a> It was brought +about by making a new war. After some sharp actions, by the resolution +and <a name="Page_76" id="Page_76" title="76" class="pagenum"></a>skill of Colonel Fullarton several of the petty princes of the most +southerly of the unwasted provinces were compelled to pay very heavy +rents and tributes, who for a long time before had not paid any +acknowledgment. After this reduction, by the care of Mr. Irwin, one of +the committee, that province was divided into twelve farms. This +operation raised the income of that particular province; the others +remain as they were first farmed. So that, instead of producing only +their original rent of 480,000<i>l.</i>, they netted, in about two years and +a quarter, 1,320,000<i>l.</i> sterling, which would be about 660,000<i>l.</i> a +year, if the recovered arrear was not included. What deduction is to be +made on account of that arrear I cannot determine, but certainly what +would reduce the annual income considerably below the rate I have +allowed.</p> + +<p>The second account received is the letting of the wasted provinces of +the Carnatic. This I understand is at a growing rent, which may or may +not realize what it promises; but if it should answer, it will raise the +whole, at some future time, to 1,200,000<i>l.</i></p> + +<p>You must here remark, Mr. Speaker, that this revenue is the produce of +<i>all</i> the Nabob's dominions. During the assignment, the Nabob paid +nothing, because the Company had all. Supposing the whole of the lately +assigned territory to yield up to the most sanguine expectations of the +right honorable gentleman, and suppose 1,200,000<i>l.</i> to be annually +realized, (of which we actually know of no more than the realizing of +six hundred thousand,) out of this you must deduct the subsidy and rent +which the Nabob paid before the assignment,—namely, 340,000<i>l.</i> a year. +This reduces back the revenue applicable to the new distribution made by +his Majesty's minis<a name="Page_77" id="Page_77" title="77" class="pagenum"></a>ters to about 800,000<i>l.</i> Of that sum five eighths +are by them surrendered to the debts. The remaining three are the only +fund left for all the purposes so magnificently displayed in the letter +of the Board of Control: that is, for a new-cast peace establishment, a +now fund for ordnance and fortifications, and a large allowance for what +they call "the splendor of the Durbar."</p> + +<p>You have heard the account of these territories as they stood in 1782. +You have seen the <i>actual</i> receipt since the assignment in 1781, of +which I reckon about two years and a quarter productive. I have stated +to you the expectation from the wasted part. For realizing all this you +may value yourselves on the vigor and diligence of a governor and +committee that have done so much. If these hopes from the committee are +rational, remember that the committee is no more. Your ministers, who +have formed their fund for these debts on the presumed effect of the +committee's management, have put a complete end to that committee. Their +acts are rescinded; their leases are broken; their renters are +dispersed. Your ministers knew, when they signed the death-warrant of +the Carnatic, that the Nabob would not only turn all these unfortunate +farmers of revenue out of employment, but that he has denounced his +severest vengeance against them, for acting under British authority. +With a knowledge of this disposition, a British Chancellor of the +Exchequer and Treasurer of the Navy, incited by no public advantage, +impelled by no public necessity, in a strain of the most wanton perfidy +which has ever stained the annals of mankind, have delivered over to +plunder, imprisonment, exile, and death itself, according to <a name="Page_78" id="Page_78" title="78" class="pagenum"></a>the mercy +of such execrable tyrants as Amir-ul-Omrah and Paul Benfield, the +unhappy and deluded souls who, untaught by uniform example, were still +weak enough to put their trust in English faith.<a name="FNanchor_44_44" id="FNanchor_44_44"></a><a href="#Footnote_44_44" class="fnanchor" title=" Appendix, No. 5.">[44]</a> They have gone +farther: they have thought proper to mock and outrage their misery by +ordering them protection and compensation. From what power is this +protection to be derived, and from what fund is this compensation to +arise? The revenues are delivered over to their oppressor; the +territorial jurisdiction, from whence that revenue is to arise, and +under which they live, is surrendered to the same iron hands: and that +they shall be deprived of all refuge and all hope, the minister has made +a solemn, voluntary declaration that he never will interfere with the +Nabob's internal government.<a name="FNanchor_45_45" id="FNanchor_45_45"></a><a href="#Footnote_45_45" class="fnanchor" title=" See extract of their letter in the Appendix, No. 9.">[45]</a></p> + +<p>The last thing considered by the Board of Control among the debts of the +Carnatic was that arising to the East India Company, which, after the +provision for the cavalry, and the consolidation of 1777, was to divide +the residue of the fund of 480,000<i>l.</i> a year with the lenders of 1767. +This debt the worthy chairman, who sits opposite to me, contends to be +three millions sterling. Lord Macartney's account of 1781 states it to +be at that period 1,200,000<i>l.</i> The first account of the Court of +Directors makes it 900,000<i>l.</i> This, like the private debt, being +without any solid existence, is incapable of any distinct limits. +Whatever its amount or its validity may be, one thing is clear: it is of +the nature and quality of a public debt. In that light nothing is +provided for it, but an eventual surplus to be divided with one class +<a name="Page_79" id="Page_79" title="79" class="pagenum"></a>of the private demands, after satisfying the two first classes. Never +was a more shameful postponing a public demand, which, by the reason of +the thing, and the uniform practice of all nations, supersedes every +private claim.</p> + +<p>Those who gave this preference to private claims consider the Company's +as a lawful demand; else why did they pretend to provide for it? On +their own principles they are condemned.</p> + +<p>But I, Sir, who profess to speak to your understanding and to your +conscience, and to brush away from this business all false colors, all +false appellations, as well as false facts, do positively deny that the +Carnatic owes a shilling to the Company,—whatever the Company may be +indebted to that undone country. It owes nothing to the Company, for +this plain and simple reason: the territory charged with the debt is +their own. To say that their revenues fall short, and owe them money, is +to say they are in debt to themselves, which is only talking nonsense. +The fact is, that, by the invasion of an enemy, and the ruin of the +country, the Company, either in its own name, or in the names of the +Nabob of Arcot and Rajah of Tanjore, has lost for several years what it +might have looked to receive from its own estate. If men were allowed to +credit themselves upon such principles, any one might soon grow rich by +this mode of accounting. A flood comes down upon a man's estate in the +Bedford Level of a thousand pounds a year, and drowns his rents for ten +years. The Chancellor would put that man into the hands of a trustee, +who would gravely make up his books, and for this loss credit himself in +his account for a debt due to him of 10,000<i>l.</i> It is, however, on this +<a name="Page_80" id="Page_80" title="80" class="pagenum"></a>principle the Company makes up its demands on the Carnatic. In peace +they go the full length, and indeed more than the full length, of what +the people can bear for current establishments; then they are absurd +enough to consolidate all the calamities of war into debts,—to +metamorphose the devastations of the country into demands upon its +future production. What is this but to avow a resolution utterly to +destroy their own country, and to force the people to pay for their +sufferings to a government which has proved unable to protect either the +share of the husbandman or their own? In every lease of a farm, the +invasion of an enemy, instead of forming a demand for arrear, is a +release of rent: nor for that release is it at all necessary to show +that the invasion has left nothing to the occupier of the soil; though +in the present case it would be too easy to prove that melancholy +fact.<a name="FNanchor_46_46" id="FNanchor_46_46"></a><a href="#Footnote_46_46" class="fnanchor" title=" "It is certain that the incursion of a _few_ of Hyder's +horse into the Jaghire, in 1767, cost the Company upwards of pagodas +27,000, _in allowances for damages_."—Consultations, February 11th, +1771.">[46]</a> I therefore applauded my right honorable friend, who, when he +canvassed the Company's accounts, as a preliminary to a bill that ought +not to stand on falsehood of any kind, fixed his discerning eye and his +deciding hand on these debts of the Company from the Nabob of Arcot and +Rajah of Tanjore, and at one stroke expunged them all, as utterly +irrecoverable: he might have added, as utterly unfounded.</p> + +<p>On these grounds I do not blame the arrangement this day in question, as +a preference given to the debt of individuals over the Company's debt. +In my eye it is no more than the preference of a fiction over a chimera; +but I blame the preference given to those <a name="Page_81" id="Page_81" title="81" class="pagenum"></a>fictitious private debts over +the standing defence and the standing government. It is there the public +is robbed. It is robbed in its army; it is robbed in its civil +administration; it is robbed in its credit; it is robbed in its +investment, which forms the commercial connection between that country +and Europe. There is the robbery.</p> + +<p>But my principal objection lies a good deal deeper. That debt to the +Company is the pretext under which all the other debts lurk and cover +themselves. That debt forms the foul, putrid mucus in which are +engendered the whole brood of creeping ascarides, all the endless +involutions, the eternal knot, added to a knot of those inexpugnable +tape-worms which devour the nutriment and eat up the bowels of +India.<a name="FNanchor_47_47" id="FNanchor_47_47"></a><a href="#Footnote_47_47" class="fnanchor" title=" Proceeding at Madras, 11th February, 1769, and throughout +the correspondence on this subject; particularly Consultations, October +4th, 1769, and the creditors' memorial, 20th January, 1770.">[47]</a> It is necessary, Sir, you should recollect two things. First, +that the Nabob's debt to the Company carries no interest. In the next +place, you will observe, that, whenever the Company has occasion to +borrow, she has always commanded whatever she thought fit at eight per +cent. Carrying in your mind these two facts, attend to the process with +regard to the public and private debt, and with what little appearance +of decency they play into each other's hands a game of utter perdition +to the unhappy natives of India. The Nabob falls into an arrear to the +Company. The Presidency presses for payment. The Nabob's answer is, "I +have no money." Good! But there are soucars who will supply you on the +mortgage of your territories. Then steps forward some Paul Benfield, +and, from his grateful compassion to the Nabob, and his <a name="Page_82" id="Page_82" title="82" class="pagenum"></a>filial regard +to the Company, he unlocks the treasures of his virtuous industry, and, +for a consideration of twenty-four or thirty-six per cent on a mortgage +of the territorial revenue, becomes security to the Company for the +Nabob's arrear.</p> + +<p>All this intermediate usury thus becomes sanctified by the ultimate view +to the Company's payment. In this case, would not a plain man ask this +plain question of the Company: If you know that the Nabob must annually +mortgage his territories to your servants to pay his annual arrear to +you, why is not the assignment or mortgage made directly to the Company +itself? By this simple, obvious operation, the Company would be relieved +and the debt paid, without the charge of a shilling interest to that +prince. But if that course should be thought too indulgent, why do they +not take that assignment with such interest to themselves as they pay to +others, that is, eight per cent? Or if it were thought more advisable +(why it should I know not) that he must borrow, why do not the Company +lend their own credit to the Nabob for their own payment? That credit +would not be weakened by the collateral security of his territorial +mortgage. The money might still be had at eight per cent. Instead of any +of these honest and obvious methods, the Company has for years kept up a +show of disinterestedness and moderation, by suffering a debt to +accumulate to them from the country powers without any interest at all; +and at the same time have seen before their eyes, on a pretext of +borrowing to pay that debt, the revenues of the country charged with an +usury of twenty, twenty-four, thirty-six, and even eight-and-forty per +cent, with compound interest,<a name="FNanchor_48_48" id="FNanchor_48_48"></a><a href="#Footnote_48_48" class="fnanchor" title=" Appendix, No. 7.">[48]</a> for the benefit of their servants. All +this time <a name="Page_83" id="Page_83" title="83" class="pagenum"></a>they know that by having a debt subsisting without any +interest, which is to be paid by contracting a debt on the highest +interest, they manifestly render it necessary to the Nabob of Arcot to +give the private demand a preference to the public; and, by binding him +and their servants together in a common cause, they enable him to form a +party to the utter ruin of their own authority and their own affairs. +Thus their false moderation, and their affected purity, by the natural +operation of everything false and everything affected, becomes pander +and bawd to the unbridled debauchery and licentious lewdness of usury +and extortion.</p> + +<p>In consequence of this double game, all the territorial revenues have at +one time or other been covered by those locusts, the English soucars. +Not one single foot of the Carnatic has escaped them: a territory as +large as England. During these operations what a scene has that country +presented!<a name="FNanchor_49_49" id="FNanchor_49_49"></a><a href="#Footnote_49_49" class="fnanchor" title=" For some part of these usurious transactions, see +Consultation, 28th January, 1781; and for the Nabob's excusing his +oppressions on account of these debts, Consultation, 26th November, +1770. "Still I undertook, first, the payment of the money belonging to +the Company, who are my kind friends, and by borrowing, and _mortgaging +my jewels, &c._, by _taking from every one of my servants_, in +proportion to their circumstances, by _fresh severities_ also on my +country, _notwithstanding its distressed state_, as you know."—The +Board's remark is as follows: after controverting some of the facts, +they say, "That his countries are oppressed is most certain, but not +from real necessity; _his debts, indeed, have afforded him a constant +pretence_ for using severities and cruel oppressions."">[49]</a> The usurious European assignee supersedes the Nabob's +native farmer of the revenue; the farmer flies to the Nabob's presence +to claim his bargain; whilst his servants murmur for wages, and his +soldiers mutiny <a name="Page_84" id="Page_84" title="84" class="pagenum"></a>for pay. The mortgage to the European assignee is then +resumed, and the native farmer replaced,—replaced, again to be removed +on the new clamor of the European assignee.<a name="FNanchor_50_50" id="FNanchor_50_50"></a><a href="#Footnote_50_50" class="fnanchor" title=" See Consultation, 28th January, 1781, where it is +asserted, and not denied, that the Nabob's farmers of revenue seldom +continue for three months together. From this the state of the country +may be easily judged of.">[50]</a> Every man of rank and +landed fortune being long since extinguished, the remaining miserable +last cultivator, who grows to the soil, after having his back scored by +the farmer, has it again flayed by the whip of the assignee, and is +thus, by a ravenous, because a short-lived succession of claimants, +lashed from oppressor to oppressor, whilst a single drop of blood is +left as the means of extorting a single grain of corn. Do not think I +paint. Far, very far, from it: I do not reach the fact, nor approach to +it. Men of respectable condition, men equal to your substantial English +yeomen, are daily tied up and scourged to answer the multiplied demands +of various contending and contradictory titles, all issuing from one and +the same source. Tyrannous exaction brings on servile concealment; and +that again calls forth tyrannous coercion. They move in a circle, +mutually producing and produced; till at length nothing of humanity is +left in the government, no trace of integrity, spirit, or manliness in +the people, who drag out a precarious and degraded existence under this +system of outrage upon human nature. Such is the effect of the +establishment of a debt to the Company, as it has hitherto been managed, +and as it ever will remain, until ideas are adopted totally different +from those which prevail at this time.<a name="Page_85" id="Page_85" title="85" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>Your worthy ministers, supporting what they are obliged to condemn, have +thought fit to renew the Company's old order against contracting private +debts in future. They begin by rewarding the violation of the ancient +law; and then they gravely reenact provisions, of which they have given +bounties for the breach. This inconsistency has been well exposed.<a name="FNanchor_51_51" id="FNanchor_51_51"></a><a href="#Footnote_51_51" class="fnanchor" title=" In Mr. Fox's speech.">[51]</a> +But what will you say to their having gone the length of giving positive +directions for contracting the debt which they positively forbid?</p> + +<p>I will explain myself. They order the Nabob, out of the revenues of the +Carnatic, to allot four hundred and eighty thousand pounds a year, as a +fund for the debts before us. For the punctual payment of this annuity, +they order him to give soucar security.<a name="FNanchor_52_52" id="FNanchor_52_52"></a><a href="#Footnote_52_52" class="fnanchor" title=" The amended letter, Appendix, No. 9.">[52]</a> When a soucar, that is, a +money-dealer, becomes security for any native prince, the course is for +the native prince to counter-secure the money-dealer, by making over to +him in mortgage a portion of his territory equal to the sum annually to +be paid, with an interest of at least twenty-four per cent. The point +fit for the House to know is, who are these soucars to whom this +security on the revenues in favor of the Nabob's creditors is to be +given? The majority of the House, unaccustomed to these transactions, +will hear with astonishment that these soucars are no other than the +creditors themselves. The minister, not content with authorizing these +transactions in a manner and to an extent unhoped for by the rapacious +expectations of usury itself, loads the broken back of the Indian +revenues, in favor of his worthy friends, the soucars, with an +ad<a name="Page_86" id="Page_86" title="86" class="pagenum"></a>ditional twenty-four per cent for being security to themselves for +their own claims, for condescending to take the country in mortgage to +pay to themselves the fruits of their own extortions.</p> + +<p>The interest to be paid for this security, according to the most +moderate strain of soucar demand, comes to 118,000<i>l.</i> a year, which, +added to the 480,000<i>l.</i> on which it is to accrue, will make the whole +charge amount to 598,000<i>l.</i> a year,—as much as even a long peace will +enable those revenues to produce. Can any one reflect for a moment on +all those claims of debt, which the minister exhausts himself in +contrivances to augment with new usuries, without lifting up his hands +and eyes in astonishment at the impudence both of the claim and of the +adjudication? Services of some kind or other these servants of the +Company must have done, so great and eminent that the Chancellor of the +Exchequer cannot think that all they have brought home is half enough. +He hallooes after them, "Gentlemen, you have forgot a large packet +behind you, in your hurry; you have not sufficiently recovered +yourselves; you ought to have, and you shall have, interest upon +interest upon a prohibited debt that is made up of interest upon +interest. Even this is too little. I have thought of another character +for you, by which you may add something to your gains: you shall be +security to yourselves; and hence will arise a new usury, which shall +efface the memory of all the usuries suggested to you by your own dull +inventions."</p> + +<p>I have done with the arrangement relative to the Carnatic. After this it +is to little purpose to observe on what the ministers have done to +Tanjore. Your <a name="Page_87" id="Page_87" title="87" class="pagenum"></a>ministers have not observed even form and ceremony in +their outrageous and insulting robbery of that country, whose only crime +has been its early and constant adherence to the power of this, and the +suffering of an uniform pillage in consequence of it. The debt of the +Company from the Rajah of Tanjore is just of the same stuff with that of +the Nabob of Arcot.</p> + +<p>The subsidy from Tanjore, on the arrear of which this pretended debt (if +any there be) has accrued to the Company, is not, like that paid by the +Nabob of Arcot, a compensation for vast countries obtained, augmented, +and preserved for him; not the price of pillaged treasuries, ransacked +houses, and plundered territories: it is a large grant, from a small +kingdom not obtained by our arms; robbed, not protected, by our power; a +grant for which no equivalent was ever given, or pretended to be given. +The right honorable gentleman, however, bears witness in his reports to +the punctuality of the payments of this grant of bounty, or, if you +please, of fear. It amounts to one hundred and sixty thousand pounds +sterling net annual subsidy. He bears witness to a further grant of a +town and port, with an annexed district of thirty thousand pound a year, +surrendered to the Company since the first donation. He has not borne +witness, but the fact is, (he will not deny it,) that in the midst of +war, and during the ruin and desolation of a considerable part of his +territories, this prince made many very large payments. Notwithstanding +these merits and services, the first regulation of ministry is to force +from him a territory of an extent which they have not yet thought proper +to ascertain,<a name="FNanchor_53_53" id="FNanchor_53_53"></a><a href="#Footnote_53_53" class="fnanchor" title=" Appendix, No. 8.">[53]</a><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88" title="88" class="pagenum"></a> for a military peace establishment the particulars of +which they have not yet been pleased to settle.</p> + +<p>The next part of their arrangement is with regard to war. As confessedly +this prince had no share in stirring up any of the former wars, so all +future wars are completely out of his power; for he has no troops +whatever, and is under a stipulation not so much as to correspond with +any foreign state, except through the Company. Yet, in case the +Company's servants should be again involved in war, or should think +proper again to provoke any enemy, as in times past they have wantonly +provoked all India, he is to be subjected to a new penalty. To what +penalty? Why, to no less than the confiscation of all his revenues. But +this is to end with the war, and they are to be faithfully returned? Oh, +no! nothing like it. The country is to remain under confiscation until +all the debt which the Company shall think fit to incur in such war +shall be discharged: that is to say, forever. His sole comfort is, to +find his old enemy, the Nabob of Arcot, placed in the very same +condition.</p> + +<p>The revenues of that miserable country were, before the invasion of +Hyder, reduced to a <i>gross</i> annual receipt of three hundred and sixty +thousand pound.<a name="FNanchor_54_54" id="FNanchor_54_54"></a><a href="#Footnote_54_54" class="fnanchor" title=" Mr. Petrie's evidence before the Select Committee, +Appendix, No. 7.">[54]</a> From this receipt the subsidy I have just stated is +taken. This again, by payments in advance, by extorting deposits of +additional sums to a vast amount for the benefit of their soucars, and +by an endless variety of other extortions, public and private, is loaded +with a debt, the amount of which I never could ascertain, but which is +large undoubtedly, generating an usury the most completely ruinous that +probably <a name="Page_89" id="Page_89" title="89" class="pagenum"></a>was ever heard of: <i>that is, forty-eight per cent, payable +monthly, with compound interest</i>.<a name="FNanchor_55_55" id="FNanchor_55_55"></a><a href="#Footnote_55_55" class="fnanchor" title=" Appendix, No. 7.">[55]</a></p> + +<p>Such is the state to which the Company's servants have reduced that +country. Now come the reformers, restorers, and comforters of India. +What have they done? In addition to all these tyrannous exactions, with +all these ruinous debts in their train, looking to one side of an +agreement whilst they wilfully shut their eyes to the other, they +withdraw from Tanjore all the benefits of the treaty of 1762, and they +subject that nation to a perpetual tribute of forty thousand a year to +the Nabob of Arcot: a tribute never due, or pretended to be due, to +<i>him</i>, even when he appeared to be something; a tribute, as things now +stand, not to a real potentate, but to a shadow, a dream, an incubus of +oppression. After the Company has accepted in subsidy, in grant of +territory, in remission of rent, as a compensation for their own +protection, at least two hundred thousand pound a year, without +discounting a shilling for that receipt, the ministers condemn this +harassed nation to be tributary to a person who is himself, by their own +arrangement, deprived of the right of war or peace, deprived of the +power of the sword, forbid to keep up a single regiment of soldiers, and +is therefore wholly disabled from all protection of the country which is +the object of the pretended tribute. Tribute hangs on the sword. It is +an incident inseparable from real, sovereign power. In the present case, +to suppose its existence is as absurd as it is cruel and oppressive. And +here, Mr. Speaker, you have a clear exemplification of the use of those +false names and false colors which the gentlemen who have lately <a name="Page_90" id="Page_90" title="90" class="pagenum"></a>taken +possession of India choose to lay on for the purpose of disguising their +plan of oppression. The Nabob of Arcot and Rajah of Tanjore have, in +truth and substance, no more than a merely civil authority, held in the +most entire dependence on the Company. The Nabob, without military, +without federal capacity, is extinguished as a potentate; but then he is +carefully kept alive as an independent and sovereign power, for the +purpose of rapine and extortion,—for the purpose of perpetuating the +old intrigues, animosities, usuries, and corruptions.</p> + +<p>It was not enough that this mockery of tribute was to be continued +without the correspondent protection, or any of the stipulated +equivalents, but ten years of arrear, to the amount of 400,000<i>l.</i> +sterling, is added to all the debts to the Company and to individuals, +in order to create a new debt, to be paid (if at all possible to be paid +in whole or in part) only by new usuries,—and all this for the Nabob of +Arcot, or rather for Mr. Benfield and the corps of the Nabob's creditors +and their soucars. Thus these miserable Indian princes are continued in +their seats for no other purpose than to render them, in the first +instance, objects of every species of extortion, and, in the second, to +force them to become, for the sake of a momentary shadow of reduced +authority, a sort of subordinate tyrants, the ruin and calamity, not the +fathers and cherishers, of their people.</p> + +<p>But take this tribute only as a mere charge (without title, cause, or +equivalent) on this people; what one step has been taken to furnish +grounds for a just calculation and estimate of the proportion of the +burden and the ability? None,—not an attempt at it. They do not adapt +the burden to the strength, but <a name="Page_91" id="Page_91" title="91" class="pagenum"></a>they estimate the strength of the +bearers by the burden they impose. Then what care is taken to leave a +fund sufficient to the future reproduction of the revenues that are to +bear all these loads? Every one, but tolerably conversant in Indian +affairs, must know that the existence of this little kingdom depends on +its control over the river Cavery. The benefits of Heaven to any +community ought never to be connected with political arrangements, or +made to depend on the personal conduct of princes, in which the mistake, +or error, or neglect, or distress, or passion of a moment, on either +side, may bring famine on millions, and ruin an innocent nation perhaps +for ages. The means of the subsistence of mankind should be as immutable +as the laws of Nature, let power and dominion take what course they +may.—Observe what has been done with regard to this important concern. +The use of this river is, indeed, at length given to the Rajah, and a +power provided for its enjoyment <i>at his own charge</i>; but the means of +furnishing that charge (and a mighty one it is) are wholly out off. This +use of the water, which ought to have no more connection than clouds and +rains and sunshine with the politics of the Rajah, the Nabob, or the +Company, is expressly contrived as a means of enforcing demands and +arrears of tribute. This horrid and unnatural instrument of extortion +had been a distinguishing feature in the enormities of the Carnatic +politics, that loudly called for reformation. But the food of a whole +people is by the reformers of India conditioned on payments from its +prince, at a moment that he is overpowered with a swarm of their +demands, without regard to the ability of either prince or people. In +fine, by opening an <a name="Page_92" id="Page_92" title="92" class="pagenum"></a>avenue to the irruption of the Nabob of Arcot's +creditors and soucars, whom every man, who did not fall in love with +oppression and corruption on an experience of the calamities they +produced, would have raised wall before wall and mound before mound to +keep from a possibility of entrance, a more destructive enemy than Hyder +Ali is introduced into that kingdom. By this part of their arrangement, +in which they establish a debt to the Nabob of Arcot, in effect and +substance, they deliver over Tanjore, bound hand and foot, to Paul +Benfield, the old betrayer, insulter, oppressor, and scourge of a +country which has for years been an object of an unremitted, but, +unhappily, an unequal struggle, between the bounties of Providence to +renovate and the wickedness of mankind to destroy.</p> + +<p>The right honorable gentleman<a name="FNanchor_56_56" id="FNanchor_56_56"></a><a href="#Footnote_56_56" class="fnanchor" title=" Mr. Dundas.">[56]</a> talks of his fairness in determining +the territorial dispute between the Nabob of Arcot and the prince of +that country, when he superseded the determination of the Directors, in +whom the law had vested the decision of that controversy. He is in this +just as feeble as he is in every other part. But it is not necessary to +say a word in refutation of any part of his argument. The mode of the +proceeding sufficiently speaks the spirit of it. It is enough to fix his +character as a judge, that he <i>never heard the Directors in defence of +their adjudication, nor either of the parties in support of their +respective claims</i>. It is sufficient for me that he takes from the Rajah +of Tanjore by this pretended adjudication, or rather from his unhappy +subjects, 40,000<i>l.</i> a year of his and their revenue, and leaves upon +his and their shoulders all the charges that can be made <a name="Page_93" id="Page_93" title="93" class="pagenum"></a>on the part of +the Nabob, on the part of his creditors, and on the part of the Company, +without so much as hearing him as to right or to ability. But what +principally induces me to leave the affair of the territorial dispute +between the Nabob and the Rajah to another day is this,—that, both the +parties being stripped of their all, it little signifies under which of +their names the unhappy, undone people are delivered over to the +merciless soucars, the allies of that right honorable gentleman and the +Chancellor of the Exchequer. In them ends the account of this long +dispute of the Nabob of Arcot and the Rajah of Tanjore.</p> + +<p>The right honorable gentleman is of opinion that his judgment in this +case can be censured by none but those who seem to act as if they were +paid agents to one of the parties. What does he think of his Court of +Directors? If they are paid by either of the parties, by which of them +does he think they are paid? He knows that their decision has been +directly contrary to his. Shall I believe that it does not enter into +his heart to conceive that any person can steadily and actively interest +himself in the protection of the injured and oppressed without being +well paid for his service? I have taken notice of this sort of discourse +some days ago, so far as it may be supposed to relate to me. I then +contented myself, as I shall now do, with giving it a cold, though a +very direct contradiction. Thus much I do from respect to truth. If I +did more, it might be supposed, by my anxiety to clear myself, that I +had imbibed the ideas which, for obvious reasons, the right honorable +gentleman wishes to have received concerning all attempts to plead the +cause of the natives of India, as if it were a disreputable employment. +If he had not forgot, in his pres<a name="Page_94" id="Page_94" title="94" class="pagenum"></a>ent occupation, every principle which +ought to have guided him, and I hope did guide him, in his late +profession, he would have known that he who takes a fee for pleading the +cause of distress against power, and manfully performs the duty he has +assumed, receives an honorable recompense for a virtuous service. But if +the right honorable gentleman will have no regard to fact in his +insinuations or to reason in his opinions, I wish him at least to +consider, that, if taking an earnest part with regard to the oppressions +exercised in India, and with regard to this most oppressive case of +Tanjore in particular, can ground a presumption of interested motives, +he is himself the most mercenary man I know. His conduct, indeed, is +such that he is on all occasions the standing testimony against himself. +He it was that first called to that case the attention of the House; the +reports of his own committee are ample and affecting upon that +subject;<a name="FNanchor_57_57" id="FNanchor_57_57"></a><a href="#Footnote_57_57" class="fnanchor" title=" See Report IV., Committee of Secrecy, pp. 73 and 74; and +Appendix, in sundry places.">[57]</a> and as many of us as have escaped his massacre must +remember the very pathetic picture he made of the sufferings of the +Tanjore country, on the day when he moved the unwieldy code of his +Indian resolutions. Has he not stated over and over again, in his +reports, the ill treatment of the Rajah of Tanjore (a branch of the +royal house of the Mahrattas, every injury to whom the Mahrattas felt as +offered to themselves) as a main cause of the alienation of that people +from the British power? And does he now think that to betray his +principles, to contradict his declarations, and to become himself an +active instrument in those oppressions which he had so tragically +lamented, is the way to clear himself of having <a name="Page_95" id="Page_95" title="95" class="pagenum"></a>been actuated by a +pecuniary interest at the time when he chose to appear full of +tenderness to that ruined nation?</p> + +<p>The right honorable gentleman is fond of parading on the motives of +others, and on his own. As to himself, he despises the imputations of +those who suppose that anything corrupt could influence him in this his +unexampled liberality of the public treasure. I do not know that I am +obliged to speak to the motives of ministry, in the arrangements they +have made of the pretended debts of Arcot and Tanjore. If I prove fraud +and collusion with regard to public money on those right honorable +gentlemen, I am not obliged to assign their motives; because no good +motives can be pleaded in favor of their conduct. Upon that case I +stand; we are at issue; and I desire to go to trial. This, I am sure, is +not loose railing, or mean insinuation, according to their low and +degenerate fashion, when they make attacks on the measures of their +adversaries. It is a regular and juridical course; and unless I choose +it, nothing can compel me to go further.</p> + +<p>But since these unhappy gentlemen have dared to hold a lofty tone about +their motives, and affect to despise suspicion, instead of being careful +not to give cause for it, I shall beg leave to lay before you some +general observations on what I conceive was their duty in so delicate a +business.</p> + +<p>If I were worthy to suggest any line of prudence to that right honorable +gentleman, I would tell him that the way to avoid suspicion in the +settlement of pecuniary transactions, in which great frauds have been +very strongly presumed, is, to attend to these few plain +principles:—First, to hear all parties <a name="Page_96" id="Page_96" title="96" class="pagenum"></a>equally, and not the managers +for the suspected claimants only; not to proceed in the dark, but to act +with as much publicity as possible; not to precipitate decision; to be +religious in following the rules prescribed in the commission under +which we act; and, lastly, and above all, not to be fond of straining +constructions, to force a jurisdiction, and to draw to ourselves the +management of a trust in its nature invidious and obnoxious to +suspicion, where the plainest letter of the law does not compel it. If +these few plain rules are observed, no corruption ought to be suspected; +if any of them are violated, suspicion will attach in proportion; if all +of them are violated, a corrupt motive of some kind or other will not +only be suspected, but must be violently presumed.</p> + +<p>The persons in whose favor all these rules have been violated, and the +conduct of ministers towards them, will naturally call for your +consideration, and will serve to lead you through a series and +combination of facts and characters, if I do not mistake, into the very +inmost recesses of this mysterious business. You will then be in +possession of all the materials on which the principles of sound +jurisprudence will found, or will reject, the presumption of corrupt +motives, or, if such motives are indicated, will point out to you of +what particular nature the corruption is.</p> + +<p>Our wonderful minister, as you all know, formed a new plan, a plan +<i>insigne, recens, indictum ore alio</i>, a plan for supporting the freedom +of our Constitution by court intrigues, and for removing its corruptions +by Indian delinquency. To carry that bold, paradoxical design into +execution, sufficient funds and apt instruments became necessary. You +are perfectly <a name="Page_97" id="Page_97" title="97" class="pagenum"></a>sensible that a Parliamentary reform occupies his +thoughts day and night, as an essential member in this extraordinary +project. In his anxious researches upon this subject, natural instinct, +as well as sound policy, would direct his eyes and settle his choice on +Paul Benfield. Paul Benfield is the grand Parliamentary reformer, the +reformer to whom the whole choir of reformers bow, and to whom even the +right honorable gentleman himself must yield the palm: for what region +in the empire, what city, what borough, what county, what tribunal in +this kingdom is not full of his labors? Others have been only +speculators; he is the grand practical reformer; and whilst the +Chancellor of the Exchequer pledges in vain the man and the minister, to +increase the provincial members, Mr. Benfield has auspiciously and +practically begun it. Leaving far behind him even Lord Camelford's +generous design of bestowing Old Sarum on the Bank of England, Mr. +Benfield has thrown in the borough of Cricklade to reinforce the county +representation. Not content with this, in order to station a steady +phalanx for all future reforms, this public-spirited usurer, amidst his +charitable toils for the relief of India, did not forget the poor, +rotten Constitution of his native country. For her, he did not disdain +to stoop to the trade of a wholesale upholsterer for this House,—to +furnish it, not with the faded tapestry figures of antiquated merit, +such as decorate, and may reproach, some other houses, but with real, +solid, living patterns of true modern virtue. Paul Benfield made +(reckoning himself) no fewer than eight members in the last Parliament. +What copious streams of pure blood must he not have transfused into the +veins of the present!<a name="Page_98" id="Page_98" title="98" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>But what is even more striking than the real services of this +new-imported patriot is his modesty. As soon as he had conferred this +benefit on the Constitution, he withdrew himself from our applause. He +conceived that the duties of a member of Parliament (which with the +elect faithful, the true believers, the <i>Islam</i> of Parliamentary reform, +are of little or no merit, perhaps not much better than specious sins) +might he as well attended to in India as in England, and the means of +reformation to Parliament itself be far better provided. Mr. Benfield +was therefore no sooner elected than he set off for Madras, and +defrauded the longing eyes of Parliament. We have never enjoyed in this +House the luxury of beholding that minion of the human race, and +contemplating that visage which has so long reflected the happiness of +nations.</p> + +<p>It was therefore not possible for the minister to consult personally +with this great man. What, then, was he to do? Through a sagacity that +never failed him in these pursuits, he found out, in Mr. Benfield's +representative, his exact resemblance. A specific attraction, by which +he gravitates towards all such characters, soon brought our minister +into a close connection with Mr. Benfield's agent and attorney, that is, +with the grand contractor, (whom I name to honor,) Mr. Richard +Atkinson,—a name that will be well remembered as long as the records of +this House, as long as the records of the British Treasury, as long as +the monumental debt of England, shall endure.</p> + +<p>This gentleman, Sir, acts as attorney for Mr. Paul Benfield. Every one +who hears me is well acquainted with the sacred friendship and the +steady mutual attachment that subsists between him and the present +<a name="Page_99" id="Page_99" title="99" class="pagenum"></a>minister. As many members as chose to attend in the first session of +this Parliament can best tell their own feelings at the scenes which +were then acted. How much that honorable gentleman was consulted in the +original frame and fabric of the bill, commonly called Mr. Pitt's India +Bill, is matter only of conjecture, though by no means difficult to +divine. But the public was an indignant witness of the ostentation with +which the measure was made his own, and the authority with which he +brought up clause after clause, to stuff and fatten the rankness of that +corrupt act. As fast as the clauses were brought up to the table, they +were accepted. No hesitation, no discussion. They were received by the +new minister, not with approbation, but with implicit submission. The +reformation may be estimated by seeing who was the reformer. Paul +Benfield's associate and agent was held up to the world as legislator of +Hindostan. But it was necessary to authenticate the coalition between +the men of intrigue in India and the minister of intrigue in England by +a studied display of the power of this their connecting link. Every +trust, every honor, every distinction, was to be heaped upon him. He was +at once made a Director of the India Company, made an alderman of +London, and to be made, if ministry could prevail, (and I am sorry to +say how near, how very near, they were prevailing,) representative of +the capital of this kingdom. But to secure his services against all +risk, he was brought in for a ministerial borough. On his part, he was +not wanting in zeal for the common cause. His advertisements show his +motives, and the merits upon which he stood. For your minister, this +worn-out veteran submitted to enter into the <a name="Page_100" id="Page_100" title="100" class="pagenum"></a>dusty field of the London +contest; and you all remember that in the same virtuous cause he +submitted to keep a sort of public office or counting-house, where the +whole business of the last general election was managed. It was openly +managed by the direct agent and attorney of Benfield. It was managed +upon Indian principles and for an Indian interest. This was the golden +cup of abominations,—this the chalice of the fornications of rapine, +usury, and oppression, which was held out by the gorgeous Eastern +harlot,—which so many of the people, so many of the nobles of this land +had drained to the very dregs. Do you think that no reckoning was to +follow this lewd debauch? that no payment was to be demanded for this +riot of public drunkenness and national prostitution? Here, you have it +here before you! The principal of the grand election-manager must be +indemnified; accordingly, the claims of Benfield and his crew must be +put above all inquiry.</p> + +<p>For several years Benfield appeared as the chief proprietor, as well as +the chief agent, director, and controller of this system of debt. The +worthy chairman of the Company has stated the claims of this single +gentleman on the Nabob of Arcot as amounting to five hundred thousand +pound.<a name="FNanchor_58_58" id="FNanchor_58_58"></a><a href="#Footnote_58_58" class="fnanchor" title=" Mr. Smith's protest.">[58]</a> Possibly at the time of the chairman's state they might have +been as high. Eight hundred thousand pound had been mentioned some time +before;<a name="FNanchor_59_59" id="FNanchor_59_59"></a><a href="#Footnote_59_59" class="fnanchor" title=" Madras correspondence on this subject.">[59]</a> and, according to the practice of shifting the names of +creditors in these transactions, and reducing or raising the debt itself +at pleasure, I think it not impossible that at one period the name of +Benfield might have stood <a name="Page_101" id="Page_101" title="101" class="pagenum"></a>before those frightful figures. But my best +information goes to fix his share no higher than four hundred thousand +pounds. By the scheme of the present ministry for adding to the +principal twelve per cent from the year 1777 to the year 1781, four +hundred thousand pounds, that smallest of the sums ever mentioned for +Mr. Benfield, will form a capital of 592,000<i>l</i>. at six per cent. Thus, +besides the arrears of three years, amounting to 106,500<i>l</i>., (which, as +fast as received, may be legally lent out at twelve per cent,) Benfield +has received, by the ministerial grant before you, an annuity of +35,520<i>l</i>. a year, charged on the public revenues.</p> + +<p>Our mirror of ministers of finance did not think this enough for the +services of such a friend as Benfield. He found that Lord Macartney, in +order to frighten the Court of Directors from the project of obliging +the Nabob to give soucar security for his debt, assured them, that, if +they should take that step, Benfield<a name="FNanchor_60_60" id="FNanchor_60_60"></a><a href="#Footnote_60_60" class="fnanchor" title=" Appendix, No 6.">[60]</a> would infallibly be the soucar, +and would thereby become the entire master of the Carnatic. What Lord +Macartney thought sufficient to deter the very agents and partakers with +Benfield in his iniquities was the inducement to the two right honorable +gentlemen to order this very soucar security to be given, and to recall +Benfield to the city of Madras from the sort of decent exile into which +he had been relegated by Lord Macartney. You must therefore consider +Benfield as soucar security for 480,000<i>l</i>. a year, which, at +twenty-four per cent, (supposing him contented with that profit,) will, +with the interest of his old debt, produce an annual income of +149,520<i>l</i>. a year.<a name="Page_102" id="Page_102" title="102" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>Here is a specimen of the new and pure aristocracy created by the right +honorable gentleman,<a name="FNanchor_61_61" id="FNanchor_61_61"></a><a href="#Footnote_61_61" class="fnanchor" title=" Right Honorable William Pitt.">[61]</a> as the support of the crown and Constitution +against the old, corrupt, refractory, natural interests of this kingdom; +and this is the grand counterpoise against all odious coalitions of +these interests. A single Benfield outweighs them all: a criminal, who +long since ought to have fattened the region kites with his offal, is by +his Majesty's ministers enthroned in the government of a great kingdom, +and enfeoffed with an estate which in the comparison effaces the +splendor of all the nobility of Europe. To bring a little more +distinctly into view the true secret of this dark transaction, I beg you +particularly to advert to the circumstances which I am going to place +before you.</p> + +<p>The general corps of creditors, as well as Mr. Benfield himself, not +looking well into futurity, nor presaging the minister of this day, +thought it not expedient for their common interest that such a name as +his should stand at the head of their list. It was therefore agreed +amongst them that Mr. Benfield should disappear, by making over his debt +to Messrs. Taylor, Majendie, and Call, and should in return be secured +by their bond.</p> + +<p>The debt thus exonerated of so great a weight of its odium, and +otherwise reduced from its alarming bulk, the agents thought they might +venture to print a list of the creditors. This was done for the first +time in the year 1783, during the Duke of Portland's administration. In +this list the name of Benfield was not to be seen. To this strong +negative testimony was added the further testimony of the Nabob of +Ar<a name="Page_103" id="Page_103" title="103" class="pagenum"></a>cot. That prince<a name="FNanchor_62_62" id="FNanchor_62_62"></a><a href="#Footnote_62_62" class="fnanchor" title=" Appendix, No. 10.">[62]</a> (or rather Mr. Benfield for him) writes to the +Court of Directors a letter<a name="FNanchor_63_63" id="FNanchor_63_63"></a><a href="#Footnote_63_63" class="fnanchor" title=" Dated 13th October. For further illustration of the style +in which these letters were written, and the principles on which they +proceed, see letters from the Nabob to the Court of Directors, dated +August 16th and September 7th, 1783, delivered by Mr. James Macpherson, +minister to the Nabob, January 14, 1784. Appendix, No. 10.">[63]</a> full of complaints and accusations +against Lord Macartney, conveyed in such terms as were natural for one +of Mr. Benfield's habits and education to employ. Amongst the rest he is +made to complain of his Lordship's endeavoring to prevent an intercourse +of politeness and sentiment between him and Mr. Benfield; and to +aggravate the affront, he expressly declares Mr. Benfield's visits to be +only on account of respect and of gratitude, as no pecuniary transaction +subsisted between them.</p> + +<p>Such, for a considerable space of time, was the outward form of the loan +of 1777, in which Mr. Benfield had no sort of concern. At length +intelligence arrived at Madras, that this debt, which had always been +renounced by the Court of Directors, was rather like to become the +subject of something more like a criminal inquiry than of any patronage +or sanction from Parliament. Every ship brought accounts, one stronger +than the other, of the prevalence of the determined enemies of the +Indian system. The public revenues became an object desperate to the +hopes of Mr. Benfield; he therefore resolved to fall upon his +associates, and, in violation of that faith which subsists among those +who have abandoned all other, commences a suit in the Mayor's Court +against Taylor, Majendie, and Call, for the bond given to him, when he +agreed to disappear for his own benefit as <a name="Page_104" id="Page_104" title="104" class="pagenum"></a>well as that of the common +concern. The assignees of his debt, who little expected the springing of +this mine, even from such an engineer as Mr. Benfield, after recovering +their first alarm, thought it best to take ground on the real state of +the transaction. They divulged the whole mystery, and were prepared to +plead that they had never received from Mr. Benfield any other +consideration for the bond than a transfer, in trust for himself, of his +demand on the Nabob of Arcot. An universal indignation arose against the +perfidy of Mr. Benfield's proceeding; the event of the suit was looked +upon as so certain, that Benfield was compelled to retreat as +precipitately as he had advanced boldly; he gave up his bond, and was +reinstated in his original demand, to wait the fortune of other +claimants. At that time, and at Madras, this hope was dull indeed; but +at home another scene was preparing.</p> + +<p>It was long before any public account of this discovery at Madras had +arrived in England, that the present minister and his Board of Control +thought fit to determine on the debt of 1777. The recorded proceedings +at this time knew nothing of any debt to Benfield. There was his own +testimony, there was the testimony of the list, there was the testimony +of the Nabob of Arcot, against it. Yet such was the ministers' feeling +of the true secret of this transaction, that they thought proper, in the +teeth of all these testimonies, to give him license to return to Madras. +Here the ministers were under some embarrassment. Confounded between +their resolution of rewarding the good services of Benfield's friends +and associates in England, and the shame of sending that notorious +incendiary to the court of the Nabob of Arcot, to re<a name="Page_105" id="Page_105" title="105" class="pagenum"></a>new his intrigues +against the British government, at the time they authorize his return, +they forbid him, under the severest penalties, from any conversation +with the Nabob or his ministers: that is, they forbid his communication +with the very person on account of his dealings with whom they permit +his return to that city. To overtop this contradiction, there is not a +word restraining him from the freest intercourse with the Nabob's second +son, the real author of all that is done in the Nabob's name; who, in +conjunction with this very Benfield, has acquired an absolute dominion +over that unhappy man, is able to persuade him to put his signature to +whatever paper they please, and often without any communication of the +contents. This management was detailed to them at full length by Lord +Macartney, and they cannot pretend ignorance of it.<a name="FNanchor_64_64" id="FNanchor_64_64"></a><a href="#Footnote_64_64" class="fnanchor" title=" Appendix, No. 6.">[64]</a></p> + +<p>I believe, after this exposure of facts, no man can entertain a doubt of +the collusion of ministers with the corrupt interest of the delinquents +in India. Whenever those in authority provide for the interest of any +person, on the real, but concealed state of his affairs, without regard +to his avowed, public, and ostensible pretences, it must be presumed +that they are in confederacy with him, because they act for him on the +same fraudulent principles on which he acts for himself. It is plain +that the ministers were fully apprised of Benfield's real situation, +which he had used means to conceal, whilst concealment answered his +purposes. They were, or the person on whom they relied was, of the +cabinet council of Benfield, in the very depth of all his mysteries. An +honest magistrate compels men to abide by one story. An equi<a name="Page_106" id="Page_106" title="106" class="pagenum"></a>table judge +would not hear of the claim of a man who had himself thought proper to +renounce it. With such a judge his shuffling and prevarication would +have damned his claims; such a judge never would have known, but in +order to animadvert upon, proceedings of that character.</p> + +<p>I have thus laid before you, Mr. Speaker, I think with sufficient +clearness, the connection of the ministers with Mr. Atkinson at the +general election; I have laid open to you the connection of Atkinson +with Benfield; I have shown Benfield's employment of his wealth in +creating a Parliamentary interest to procure a ministerial protection; I +have set before your eyes his large concern in the debt, his practices +to hide that concern from the public eye, and the liberal protection +which he has received from the minister. If this chain of circumstances +does not lead you necessarily to conclude that the minister has paid to +the avarice of Benfield the services done by Benfield's connections to +his ambition, I do not know anything short of the confession of the +party that can persuade you of his guilt. Clandestine and collusive +practice can only be traced by combination and comparison of +circumstances. To reject such combination and comparison is to reject +the only means of detecting fraud; it is, indeed, to give it a patent +and free license to cheat with impunity.</p> + +<p>I confine myself to the connection of ministers, mediately or +immediately, with only two persons concerned in this debt. How many +others, who support their power and greatness within and without doors, +are concerned originally, or by transfers of these debts, must be left +to general opinion. I refer to the reports of the Select Committee for +the proceedings <a name="Page_107" id="Page_107" title="107" class="pagenum"></a>of some of the agents in these affairs, and their +attempts, at least, to furnish ministers with the means of buying +General Courts, and even whole Parliaments, in the gross.<a name="FNanchor_65_65" id="FNanchor_65_65"></a><a href="#Footnote_65_65" class="fnanchor" title=" Second Report of Select (General Smith's) Committee.">[65]</a></p> + +<p>I know that the ministers will think it little less than acquittal, that +they are not charged with having taken to themselves some part of the +money of which they have made so liberal a donation to their partisans, +though the charge may be indisputably fixed upon the corruption of their +politics. For my part, I follow their crimes to that point to which +legal presumptions and natural indications lead me, without considering +what species of evil motive tends most to aggravate or to extenuate the +guilt of their conduct. But if I am to speak my private sentiments, I +think that in a thousand cases for one it would be far less mischievous +to the public, and full as little dishonorable to themselves, to be +polluted with direct bribery, than thus to become a standing auxiliary +to the oppression, usury, and peculation of multitudes, in order to +obtain a corrupt support to their power. It is by bribing, not so often +by being bribed, that wicked politicians bring rum on mankind. Avarice +is a rival to the pursuits of many. It finds a multitude of checks, and +many opposers, in every walk of life. But the objects of ambition are +for the few; and every person who aims at indirect profit, and therefore +wants other protection than innocence and law, instead of its rival, +becomes its instrument. There is a natural allegiance and fealty due to +this domineering, paramount evil, from all the vassal vices, which +acknowledge its superiority, and readily militate under its banners; and +it is under that discipline alone <a name="Page_108" id="Page_108" title="108" class="pagenum"></a>that avarice is able to spread to any +considerable extent, or to render itself a general, public mischief. It +is therefore no apology for ministers, that they have not been bought by +the East India delinquents, but that they have only formed an alliance +with them for screening each other from justice, according to the +exigence of their several necessities. That they have done so is +evident; and the junction of the power of office in England with the +abuse of authority in the East has not only prevented even the +appearance of redress to the grievances of India, but I wish it may not +be found to have dulled, if not extinguished, the honor, the candor, the +generosity, the good-nature, which used formerly to characterize the +people of England. I confess, I wish that some more feeling than I have +yet observed for the sufferings of our fellow-creatures and +fellow-subjects in that oppressed part of the world had manifested +itself in any one quarter of the kingdom, or in any one large +description of men.</p> + +<p>That these oppressions exist is a fact no more denied than it is +resented as it ought to be. Much evil has been done in India under the +British authority. What has been done to redress it? We are no longer +surprised at anything. We are above the unlearned and vulgar passion of +admiration. But it will astonish posterity, when they read our opinions +in our actions, that, after years of inquiry, we have found out that the +sole grievance of India consisted in this, that the servants of the +Company there had not profited enough of their opportunities, nor +drained it sufficiently of its treasures,—when they shall hear that the +very first and only important act of a commission specially named by act +of Parliament is, to charge <a name="Page_109" id="Page_109" title="109" class="pagenum"></a>upon an undone country, in favor of a +handful of men in the humblest ranks of the public service, the enormous +sum of perhaps four millions of sterling money.</p> + +<p>It is difficult for the most wise and upright government to correct the +abuses of remote, delegated power, productive of unmeasured wealth, and +protected by the boldness and strength of the same ill-got riches. These +abuses, full of their own wild native vigor, will grow and flourish +under mere neglect. But where the supreme authority, not content with +winking at the rapacity of its inferior instruments, is so shameless and +corrupt as openly to give bounties and premiums for disobedience to its +laws,—when it will not trust to the activity of avarice in the pursuit +of its own gains,—when it secures public robbery by all the careful +jealousy and attention with which it ought to protect property from such +violence,—the commonwealth then is become totally perverted from its +purposes; neither God nor man will long endure it; nor will it long +endure itself. In that case, there is an unnatural infection, a +pestilential taint, fermenting in the constitution of society, which +fever and convulsions of some kind or other must throw off, or in which +the vital powers, worsted in an unequal struggle, are pushed back upon +themselves, and, by a reversal of their whole functions, fester to +gangrene, to death,—and instead of what was but just now the delight +and boast of the creation, there will be cast out in the face of the sun +a bloated, putrid, noisome carcass, full of stench and poison, an +offence, a horror, a lesson to the world.</p> + +<p>In my opinion, we ought not to wait for the fruitless instruction of +calamity to inquire into the abuses <a name="Page_110" id="Page_110" title="110" class="pagenum"></a>which bring upon us ruin in the +worst of its forms, in the loss of our fame and virtue. But the right +honorable gentleman<a name="FNanchor_66_66" id="FNanchor_66_66"></a><a href="#Footnote_66_66" class="fnanchor" title=" Mr. Dundas.">[66]</a> says, in answer to all the powerful arguments of +my honorable friend, "that this inquiry is of a delicate nature, and +that the state will suffer detriment by the exposure of this +transaction." But it is exposed; it is perfectly known in every member, +in every particle, and in every way, except that which may lead to a +remedy. He knows that the papers of correspondence are printed, and that +they are in every hand.</p> + +<p>He and delicacy are a rare and a singular coalition. He thinks that to +divulge our Indian politics may be highly dangerous. He! the mover, the +chairman, the reporter of the Committee of Secrecy! he, that brought +forth in the utmost detail, in several vast, printed folios, the most +recondite parts of the politics, the military, the revenues of the +British empire in India! With six great chopping bastards,<a name="FNanchor_67_67" id="FNanchor_67_67"></a><a href="#Footnote_67_67" class="fnanchor" title=" Six Reports of the Committee of Secrecy.">[67]</a> each as +lusty as an infant Hercules, this delicate creature blushes at the sight +of his new bridegroom, assumes a virgin delicacy; or, to use a more fit, +as well as a more poetic comparison, the person so squeamish, so timid, +so trembling lest the winds of heaven should visit too roughly, is +expanded to broad sunshine, exposed like the sow of imperial augury, +lying in the mud with all the prodigies of her fertility about her, as +evidence of her delicate amours,—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Triginta capitum fœtus enixa jacebat,<br /></span> +<span>Alba, solo recubans, albi circum ubera nati.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Whilst discovery of the misgovernment of others led to his own power, it +was wise to inquire, it was <a name="Page_111" id="Page_111" title="111" class="pagenum"></a>safe to publish: there was then no +delicacy; there was then no danger. But when his object is obtained, and +in his imitation he has outdone the crimes that he had reprobated in +volumes of reports and in sheets of bills of pains and penalties, then +concealment becomes prudence, and it concerns the safety of the state +that we should not know, in a mode of Parliamentary cognizance, what all +the world knows but too well, that is, in what manner he chooses to +dispose of the public revenues to the creatures of his politics.</p> + +<p>The debate has been long, and as much so on my part, at least, as on the +part of those who have spoken before me. But long as it is, the more +material half of the subject has hardly been touched on: that is, the +corrupt and destructive system to which this debt has been rendered +subservient, and which seems to be pursued with at least as much vigor +and regularity as ever. If I considered your ease or my own, rather than +the weight and importance of this question, I ought to make some apology +to you, perhaps some apology to myself, for having detained your +attention so long. I know on what ground I tread. This subject, at one +time taken up with so much fervor and zeal, is no longer a favorite in +this House. The House itself has undergone a great and signal +revolution. To some the subject is strange and uncouth; to several, +harsh and distasteful; to the relics of the last Parliament it is a +matter of fear and apprehension. It is natural for those who have seen +their friends sink in the tornado which raged during the late shift of +the monsoon, and have hardly escaped on the planks of the general wreck, +it is but too natural for them, as soon as they make the rocks and +quicksands of their former disasters, to put about <a name="Page_112" id="Page_112" title="112" class="pagenum"></a>their new-built +barks, and, as much as possible, to keep aloof from this perilous lee +shore.</p> + +<p>But let us do what we please to put India from our thoughts, we can do +nothing to separate it from our public interest and our national +reputation. Our attempts to banish this importunate duty will only make +it return upon us again and again, and every time in a shape more +unpleasant than the former. A government has been fabricated for that +great province; the right honorable gentleman says that therefore you +ought not to examine into its conduct. Heavens! what an argument is +this! We are not to examine into the conduct of the Direction, because +it is an old government; we are not to examine into this Board of +Control, because it is a new one. Then we are only to examine into the +conduct of those who have no conduct to account for. Unfortunately, the +basis of this new government has been laid on old, condemned +delinquents, and its superstructure is raised out of prosecutors turned +into protectors. The event has been such as might be expected. But if it +had been otherwise constituted, had it been constituted even as I +wished, and as the mover of this question had planned, the better part +of the proposed establishment was in the publicity of its proceedings, +in its perpetual responsibility to Parliament. Without this check, what +is our government at home, even awed, as every European government is, +by an audience formed of the other states of Europe, by the applause or +condemnation of the discerning and critical company before which it +acts? But if the scene on the other side of the globe, which tempts, +invites, almost compels, to tyranny and rapine, be not inspected with +the eye of a severe and unremit<a name="Page_113" id="Page_113" title="113" class="pagenum"></a>ting vigilance, shame and destruction +must ensue. For one, the worst event of this day, though it may deject, +shall not break or subdue me. The call upon us is authoritative. Let who +will shrink back, I shall be found at my post. Baffled, discountenanced, +subdued, discredited, as the cause of justice and humanity is, it will +be only the dearer to me. Whoever, therefore, shall at any time bring +before you anything towards the relief of our distressed fellow-citizens +in India, and towards a subversion of the present most corrupt and +oppressive system for its government, in me shall find a weak, I am +afraid, but a steady, earnest, and faithful assistant.<a name="Page_114" id="Page_114" title="114" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1" /><a href="#FNanchor_1_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> Right Honorable Henry Dundas.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_2_2" id="Footnote_2_2" /><a href="#FNanchor_2_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> Sir Thomas Rumbold, late Governor of Madras.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_3_3" id="Footnote_3_3" /><a href="#FNanchor_3_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> Appendix, <a href="#No_1">No. 1</a>.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_4_4" id="Footnote_4_4" /><a href="#FNanchor_4_4"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> The whole of the net Irish hereditary revenue is, on a +medium of the last seven years, about 330,000<i>l.</i> yearly. The revenues +of all denominations fall short more than 150,000<i>l.</i> yearly of the +charges. On the <i>present</i> produce, if Mr. Pitt's scheme was to take +place, he might gain from seven to ten thousand pounds a year.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_5_5" id="Footnote_5_5" /><a href="#FNanchor_5_5"><span class="label">[5]</span></a> Mr. Smith's Examination before the Select Committee. +Appendix, <a href="#No_2">No. 2</a>.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_6_6" id="Footnote_6_6" /><a href="#FNanchor_6_6"><span class="label">[6]</span></a> Appendix, <a href="#No_2">No. 2</a>.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_7_7" id="Footnote_7_7" /><a href="#FNanchor_7_7"><span class="label">[7]</span></a> Fourth Report, Mr. Dundas's Committee, p. 4.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_8_8" id="Footnote_8_8" /><a href="#FNanchor_8_8"><span class="label">[8]</span></a> A witness examined before the Committee of Secrecy says +that eighteen per cent was the usual interest, but he had heard that +more had been given. The above is the account which Mr. B. received.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_9_9" id="Footnote_9_9" /><a href="#FNanchor_9_9"><span class="label">[9]</span></a> Mr. Dundas.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_10_10" id="Footnote_10_10" /><a href="#FNanchor_10_10"><span class="label">[10]</span></a> For the threats of the creditors, and total subversion of +the authority of the Company in favor of the Nabob's power and the +increase thereby of his evil dispositions, and the great derangement of +all public concerns, see Select Committee Fort St. George's letters, +21st November, 1769, and January 31st, 1770; September 11, 1772; and +Governor Bourchier's letters to the Nabob of Arcot, 21st November, 1769, +and December 9th, 1769.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_11_11" id="Footnote_11_11" /><a href="#FNanchor_11_11"><span class="label">[11]</span></a> "He [the Nabob] is in a great degree the cause of our +present inability, by diverting the revenues of the Carnatic through +<i>private channels</i>." "Even this peshcush [the Tanjore tribute], +circumstanced as he and we are, he has assigned over to others, <i>who now +set themselves in opposition to the Company</i>."—Consultations, October +11, 1769, on the 12th communicated to the Nabob.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_12_12" id="Footnote_12_12" /><a href="#FNanchor_12_12"><span class="label">[12]</span></a> Nabob's letter to Governor Palk. Papers published by the +Directors in 1775; and papers printed by the same authority, 1781.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_13_13" id="Footnote_13_13" /><a href="#FNanchor_13_13"><span class="label">[13]</span></a> See papers printed by order of a General Court in 1780, +pp. 222 and 224; as also Nabob's letter to Governor Dupré, 19th July, +1771: "I have taken up loans by which I have suffered a loss of <i>upwards +of a crore of pagodas</i> [four millions sterling] <i>by interest on an heavy +interest</i>." Letter 15th January, 1772: "Notwithstanding I have taken +much trouble, and have made many payments to my creditors, yet the load +of my debt, <i>which became so great by interest and compound interest</i>, +is not cleared."</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_14_14" id="Footnote_14_14" /><a href="#FNanchor_14_14"><span class="label">[14]</span></a> The Nabob of Arcot.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_15_15" id="Footnote_15_15" /><a href="#FNanchor_15_15"><span class="label">[15]</span></a> Appendix, <a href="#No_3">No. 3</a>.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_16_16" id="Footnote_16_16" /><a href="#FNanchor_16_16"><span class="label">[16]</span></a> See Mr. Dundas's 1st, 2d, and 3d Reports.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_17_17" id="Footnote_17_17" /><a href="#FNanchor_17_17"><span class="label">[17]</span></a> See further Consultations, 3d February, 1778.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_18_18" id="Footnote_18_18" /><a href="#FNanchor_18_18"><span class="label">[18]</span></a> Mr. Dundas's 1st Report, pp. 26, 29, and Appendix, No. 2, +10, 18, for the mutinous state and desertion of the Nabob's troops for +want of pay. See also Report IV. of the same committee.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_19_19" id="Footnote_19_19" /><a href="#FNanchor_19_19"><span class="label">[19]</span></a> Memorial from the creditors to the Governor and Council, +22d January, 1770.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_20_20" id="Footnote_20_20" /><a href="#FNanchor_20_20"><span class="label">[20]</span></a> In the year 1778, Mr. James Call, one of the proprietors +of this specific debt, was actually mayor. (Appendix to 2d Report of Mr. +Dundas's committee, No. 65.) The only proof which appeared on the +inquiry instituted in the General Court of 1781 was an affidavit of <i>the +lenders themselves</i>, deposing (what nobody ever denied) that they had +<i>engaged</i> and <i>agreed</i> to pay—not that they <i>had</i> paid—the sum of +160,000<i>l.</i> This was two years after the transaction; and the affidavit +is made before George Proctor, mayor, an attorney for certain of the old +creditors.—Proceedings of the President and Council of Fort St. George, +22d February, 1779.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_21_21" id="Footnote_21_21" /><a href="#FNanchor_21_21"><span class="label">[21]</span></a> Right Honorable Henry Dundas.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_22_22" id="Footnote_22_22" /><a href="#FNanchor_22_22"><span class="label">[22]</span></a> Appendix to the 4th Report of Mr. Dundas's committee, No +15.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_23_23" id="Footnote_23_23" /><a href="#FNanchor_23_23"><span class="label">[23]</span></a> "No sense of the common danger, in case of a war, can +prevail on him [the Nabob of Arcot] to furnish the Company with what is +absolutely necessary to assemble an army, though it is beyond a doubt +that money to a large amount is now hoarded up in his coffers at +Chepauk; and tunkaws are granted to <i>individuals</i>, upon some of his most +<i>valuable countries</i>, for payment of part of those debts which he has +contracted, and <i>which certainly will not bear inspection, as neither +debtor nor creditors have ever had the confidence to submit the accounts +to our examination</i>, though they expressed a wish to consolidate the +debts under the auspices of this government, agreeably to a plan they +had formed."—Madras Consultations, 20th July, 1778. Mr. Dundas's +Appendix to 2nd Report, 143. See also last Appendix to ditto Report, No. +376, B.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_24_24" id="Footnote_24_24" /><a href="#FNanchor_24_24"><span class="label">[24]</span></a> Transcriber's note: Footnote missing in original text.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_25_25" id="Footnote_25_25" /><a href="#FNanchor_25_25"><span class="label">[25]</span></a> Lord Pigot</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_26_26" id="Footnote_26_26" /><a href="#FNanchor_26_26"><span class="label">[26]</span></a> In Sir Thomas Rumbold's letter to the Court of Directors, +March 15th, 1778, he represents it as higher, in the following +manner:—"How shall I paint to you my astonishment, on my arrival here, +when I was informed, that, independent of this four lacs of pagodas [the +Cavalry Loan], independent of the Nabob's debt to his old creditors, and +the money due to the Company, he had contracted a debt to the enormous +amount of sixty-three lacs of pagodas [2,520,000<i>l.</i>]. I mention this +circumstance to you <i>with horror</i>; for the creditors being in general +<i>servants of the Company</i> renders my task, on the part of the Company, +<i>difficult and invidious</i>." "I have freed the sanction of this +government from so <i>corrupt</i> a transaction. It is in my mind the most +venal of all proceedings to give the Company's protection to debts that +cannot bear the light; and though it appears exceedingly alarming, that +a country on which you are to depend for resources should be so involved +as to be nearly three years' revenue in debt,—in a country, too, where +one year's revenue can never be called <i>secure</i>, by men who know +anything of the politics of this part of India." "I think it proper to +mention to you, that, although <i>the Nabob reports his private debt to +amount to upwards of sixty lacs</i>, yet I understand that it is not quite +so much." Afterwards Sir Thomas Rumbold recommended this debt to the +favorable attention of the Company, but without any sufficient reason +for his change of disposition. However, he went no further.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_27_27" id="Footnote_27_27" /><a href="#FNanchor_27_27"><span class="label">[27]</span></a> Nabob's proposals, November 25th, 1778; and memorial of +the creditors, March 1st, 1779.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_28_28" id="Footnote_28_28" /><a href="#FNanchor_28_28"><span class="label">[28]</span></a> Nabob's proposals to his new consolidated creditors, +November 25th, 1778.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_29_29" id="Footnote_29_29" /><a href="#FNanchor_29_29"><span class="label">[29]</span></a> Paper signed by the Nabob, 6th January, 1780.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_30_30" id="Footnote_30_30" /><a href="#FNanchor_30_30"><span class="label">[30]</span></a> Kistbundi to July 31, 1780.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_31_31" id="Footnote_31_31" /><a href="#FNanchor_31_31"><span class="label">[31]</span></a> Governor's letter to the Nabob, 25th July, 1779.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_32_32" id="Footnote_32_32" /><a href="#FNanchor_32_32"><span class="label">[32]</span></a> Report of the Select Committee, Madras Consultations, +January 7, 1771. See also papers published by the order of the Court of +Directors in 1776; and Lord Macartney's correspondence with Mr. Hastings +and the Nabob of Arcot. See also Mr. Dundas's Appendix, No 376, B. +Nabob's propositions through Mr. Sulivan and Assam Khân, Art. 6, and +indeed the whole.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_33_33" id="Footnote_33_33" /><a href="#FNanchor_33_33"><span class="label">[33]</span></a> "The principal object of the expedition is, to get money +from Tanjore to pay the Nabob's debt: if a surplus, to be applied in +discharge of the Nabob's debts to his private creditors." +(Consultations, March 20, 1771; and for further lights, Consultations, +12th June, 1771.) "We are alarmed lest this debt to <i>individuals</i> should +have been the <i>real</i> motive for the aggrandizement of Mahomed Ali [the +Nabob of Arcot], and that <i>we are plunged into a war</i> to put him in +possession of the Mysore revenues <i>for the discharge of the +debt</i>."—Letter from the Directors, March 17, 1769.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_34_34" id="Footnote_34_34" /><a href="#FNanchor_34_34"><span class="label">[34]</span></a> Letter from the Nabob, May 1st, 1768; and ditto, 24th +April, 1770, 1st October; ditto, 16th September, 1772, 16th March, +1773.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_35_35" id="Footnote_35_35" /><a href="#FNanchor_35_35"><span class="label">[35]</span></a> Letter from the Presidency at Madras to the Court of +Directors, 27th June, 1769.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_36_36" id="Footnote_36_36" /><a href="#FNanchor_36_36"><span class="label">[36]</span></a> Mr. Dundas's committee. Report L, Appendix, No. 29.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_37_37" id="Footnote_37_37" /><a href="#FNanchor_37_37"><span class="label">[37]</span></a> Appendix, <a href="#No_4">No. 4</a>. Report of the Committee of Assigned +Revenue.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_38_38" id="Footnote_38_38" /><a href="#FNanchor_38_38"><span class="label">[38]</span></a> Mr. Barnard's map of the Jaghire</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_39_39" id="Footnote_39_39" /><a href="#FNanchor_39_39"><span class="label">[39]</span></a> See Report IV., Mr. Dundas's committee, p. 46.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_40_40" id="Footnote_40_40" /><a href="#FNanchor_40_40"><span class="label">[40]</span></a> Interest is rated in India by the month.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_41_41" id="Footnote_41_41" /><a href="#FNanchor_41_41"><span class="label">[41]</span></a> Mr. Dundas's committee. Rep. I. p. 9, and ditto, Rep. IV. +69, where the revenue of 1777 stated only at 22 lacs,—30 lacs stated as +the revenue, "<i>supposing</i> the Carnatic to be <i>properly</i> managed."</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_42_42" id="Footnote_42_42" /><a href="#FNanchor_42_42"><span class="label">[42]</span></a> See Appendix, <a href="#No_4">No. 4</a>. statement in the Report of the +Committee of Assigned Revenue.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_43_43" id="Footnote_43_43" /><a href="#FNanchor_43_43"><span class="label">[43]</span></a> The province of Tinnevelly.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_44_44" id="Footnote_44_44" /><a href="#FNanchor_44_44"><span class="label">[44]</span></a> Appendix, <a href="#No_5">No. 5</a>.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_45_45" id="Footnote_45_45" /><a href="#FNanchor_45_45"><span class="label">[45]</span></a> See extract of their letter in the Appendix, <a href="#No_9">No. 9</a>.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_46_46" id="Footnote_46_46" /><a href="#FNanchor_46_46"><span class="label">[46]</span></a> "It is certain that the incursion of a <i>few</i> of Hyder's +horse into the Jaghire, in 1767, cost the Company upwards of pagodas +27,000, <i>in allowances for damages</i>."—Consultations, February 11th, +1771.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_47_47" id="Footnote_47_47" /><a href="#FNanchor_47_47"><span class="label">[47]</span></a> Proceeding at Madras, 11th February, 1769, and throughout +the correspondence on this subject; particularly Consultations, October +4th, 1769, and the creditors' memorial, 20th January, 1770.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_48_48" id="Footnote_48_48" /><a href="#FNanchor_48_48"><span class="label">[48]</span></a> Appendix, <a href="#No_7">No. 7</a>.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_49_49" id="Footnote_49_49" /><a href="#FNanchor_49_49"><span class="label">[49]</span></a> For some part of these usurious transactions, see +Consultation, 28th January, 1781; and for the Nabob's excusing his +oppressions on account of these debts, Consultation, 26th November, +1770. "Still I undertook, first, the payment of the money belonging to +the Company, who are my kind friends, and by borrowing, and <i>mortgaging +my jewels, &c.</i>, by <i>taking from every one of my servants</i>, in +proportion to their circumstances, by <i>fresh severities</i> also on my +country, <i>notwithstanding its distressed state</i>, as you know."—The +Board's remark is as follows: after controverting some of the facts, +they say, "That his countries are oppressed is most certain, but not +from real necessity; <i>his debts, indeed, have afforded him a constant +pretence</i> for using severities and cruel oppressions."</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_50_50" id="Footnote_50_50" /><a href="#FNanchor_50_50"><span class="label">[50]</span></a> See Consultation, 28th January, 1781, where it is +asserted, and not denied, that the Nabob's farmers of revenue seldom +continue for three months together. From this the state of the country +may be easily judged of.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_51_51" id="Footnote_51_51" /><a href="#FNanchor_51_51"><span class="label">[51]</span></a> In Mr. Fox's speech.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_52_52" id="Footnote_52_52" /><a href="#FNanchor_52_52"><span class="label">[52]</span></a> The amended letter, Appendix, <a href="#No_9">No. 9</a>.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_53_53" id="Footnote_53_53" /><a href="#FNanchor_53_53"><span class="label">[53]</span></a> Appendix, <a href="#No_8">No. 8</a>.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_54_54" id="Footnote_54_54" /><a href="#FNanchor_54_54"><span class="label">[54]</span></a> Mr. Petrie's evidence before the Select Committee, +Appendix, <a href="#No_7">No. 7</a>.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_55_55" id="Footnote_55_55" /><a href="#FNanchor_55_55"><span class="label">[55]</span></a> Appendix, <a href="#No_7">No. 7</a>.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_56_56" id="Footnote_56_56" /><a href="#FNanchor_56_56"><span class="label">[56]</span></a> Mr. Dundas.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_57_57" id="Footnote_57_57" /><a href="#FNanchor_57_57"><span class="label">[57]</span></a> See Report IV., Committee of Secrecy, pp. 73 and 74; and +Appendix, in sundry places.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_58_58" id="Footnote_58_58" /><a href="#FNanchor_58_58"><span class="label">[58]</span></a> Mr. Smith's protest.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_59_59" id="Footnote_59_59" /><a href="#FNanchor_59_59"><span class="label">[59]</span></a> Madras correspondence on this subject.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_60_60" id="Footnote_60_60" /><a href="#FNanchor_60_60"><span class="label">[60]</span></a> Appendix, No 6.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_61_61" id="Footnote_61_61" /><a href="#FNanchor_61_61"><span class="label">[61]</span></a> Right Honorable William Pitt.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_62_62" id="Footnote_62_62" /><a href="#FNanchor_62_62"><span class="label">[62]</span></a> Appendix, <a href="#No_10">No. 10</a>.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_63_63" id="Footnote_63_63" /><a href="#FNanchor_63_63"><span class="label">[63]</span></a> Dated 13th October. For further illustration of the style +in which these letters were written, and the principles on which they +proceed, see letters from the Nabob to the Court of Directors, dated +August 16th and September 7th, 1783, delivered by Mr. James Macpherson, +minister to the Nabob, January 14, 1784. Appendix, <a href="#No_10">No. 10</a>.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_64_64" id="Footnote_64_64" /><a href="#FNanchor_64_64"><span class="label">[64]</span></a> Appendix, <a href="#No_6">No. 6</a>.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_65_65" id="Footnote_65_65" /><a href="#FNanchor_65_65"><span class="label">[65]</span></a> Second Report of Select (General Smith's) Committee.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_66_66" id="Footnote_66_66" /><a href="#FNanchor_66_66"><span class="label">[66]</span></a> Mr. Dundas.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_67_67" id="Footnote_67_67" /><a href="#FNanchor_67_67"><span class="label">[67]</span></a> Six Reports of the Committee of Secrecy.</p></div> +</div> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="APPENDIX" id="APPENDIX" />APPENDIX.</h3> + +<hr style='width: 15%;' /> + +<h3><a name="No_1" id="No_1" />No. 1.<br /> +<br /> +CLAUSES OF MR PITT'S BILL.<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%;">Referred to from p. <a href="#Page_17">17</a>.</span></h3> + +<div class="blockquote"><p><i>Appointing Commissioners to inquire into the Fees, Gratuities, +Perquisites, Emoluments, which are, or have been lately, received in the +several Public Offices therein mentioned; to examine into any Abuses +which may exist in the same, &c.</i></p></div> + + +<p>And be it further enacted, that it shall and may be lawful to and for +the said commissioners, or any two of them, and they are hereby +empowered, authorized, and required, <i>to examine upon oath</i> (which oath +they, or any two of them, are hereby authorized to administer) the +several persons, of <i>all</i> descriptions, belonging to any of the offices +or departments before mentioned, and <i>all other persons</i> whom the said +commissioners, or any two of them, shall think fit to examine, touching +<i>the business</i> of each office or department, and <i>the fees, gratuities, +perquisites, and emoluments taken therein</i>, and touching all other +matters and things necessary for the execution of the powers vested in +the said commissioners by this act; <i>all which persons</i> are hereby +required and directed punctually to attend the said commissioners, <i>at +such time and place as they, or any two of them, shall appoint, and also +to observe and execute such orders and directions</i> as the said +commissioners, or any two of <a name="Page_115" id="Page_115" title="115" class="pagenum"></a>them, shall make or give for the purposes +before mentioned.</p> + +<p>And be it enacted by the authority aforesaid, that the said +commissioners, or any two of them, shall be and are hereby empowered to +examine into any corrupt and fraudulent practices, or other misconduct, +committed by any person or persons concerned in the management of any of +the offices or departments hereinbefore mentioned; and for the better +execution of this present act, the said commissioners, or <i>any two of +them, are hereby authorized to meet and sit, from time to time, in such +place or places as they shall find most convenient, with, or without +adjournment, and to send their precept or precepts, under their hands +and seals, for any person or persons whatsoever, and for such books, +papers, writings, or records, as they shall judge necessary for their +information, relating to any of the offices or departments hereinbefore +mentioned; and all bailiffs, constables, sheriffs, and other his +Majesty's officers, are hereby required to obey and execute such orders +and precepts aforesaid as shall be sent to them, or any of them, by the +said commissioners, or any two of them, touching the premises.</i></p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<h3><a name="No_2" id="No_2" />No. 2.<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%">Referred to from p. <a href="#Page_22">22</a>.</span><br /> +<br /> +NABOB OF ARCOT'S DEBTS.</h3> + +<p>Mr. George Smith being asked, Whether the debts of the Nabob of Arcot +have increased since he knew Madras? he said, Yes, they have. He +distinguishes <a name="Page_116" id="Page_116" title="116" class="pagenum"></a>his debts into two sorts: those contracted before the +year 1766, and those contracted from that year to the year in which he +left Madras.—Being asked, What he thinks is the original amount of the +old debts? he said, Between twenty-three and twenty-four lacs of +pagodas, as well as he can recollect.—Being asked, What was the amount +of that debt when he left Madras? he said, Between four and five lacs of +pagodas, as he understood.—Being asked, What was the amount of the new +debt when he left Madras? he said, In November, 1777, that debt +amounted, according to the Nabob's own account, and published at +Chepauk, his place of residence, to sixty lacs of pagodas, independent +of the old debt, on which debt of sixty lacs of pagodas the Nabob did +agree to pay an interest of twelve per cent per annum.—Being asked, +Whether this debt was approved of by the Court of Directors? he said, He +does not know it was.—Being asked, Whether the old debt was recognized +by the Court of Directors? he said, Yes, it has been; and the Court of +Directors have sent out repeated orders to the President and Council of +Madras to enforce its recovery and payment.—Being asked, If the +interest upon the new debt is punctually paid? he said, It was not +during his residence at Madras, from 1777 to 1779, in which period he +thinks no more than five per cent interest was paid, in different +dividends of two and one per cent.—Being asked, What is the usual +course taken by the Nabob concerning the arrears of interest? he said, +Not having ever lent him moneys himself, he cannot fully answer as to +the mode of settling the interest with him.</p> + +<p>Being asked, Whether he has reason to believe the sixty lacs of pagodas +was all principal money really <a name="Page_117" id="Page_117" title="117" class="pagenum"></a>and truly advanced to the Nabob of +Arcot, or a fictitious capital, made up of obligations given by him, +where no money or goods were received, or which was increased by the +uniting into it a greater interest than the twelve per cent expressed to +be due on the capital? he said, He has no reason to believe that the sum +of sixty lacs of pagodas was lent in money or goods to the Nabob, +because that sum he thinks is of more value than all the money, goods, +and chattels in the settlement; but he does not know in what mode or +manner this debt of the Nabob's was incurred or accumulated.—Being +asked, Whether it was not a general and well-grounded opinion at Madras, +that a great part of this sum was accumulated by obligations, and was +for services performed or to be performed for the Nabob? he said, He has +heard that a part of this debt was given for the purposes mentioned in +the above question, but he does not know that it was so.—Being asked, +Whether it was the general opinion of the settlement? he said, He cannot +say that it was the general opinion, but it was the opinion of a +considerable part of the settlement.—Being asked, Whether it was the +declared opinion of those that were concerned in the debt, or those that +were not? he said, It was the opinion of both parties, at least such of +them as he conversed with.—Being asked, Whether he has reason to +believe that the interest really paid by the Nabob, upon obligations +given, or money lent, did not frequently exceed twelve per cent? he +said, Prior to the 1st of August, 1774, he had had reason to believe +that a higher interest than twelve per cent was paid by the Nabob on +moneys lent to him; but from and after that period, when the last act of +Parliament took place in India, <a name="Page_118" id="Page_118" title="118" class="pagenum"></a>he does not know that more than twelve +per cent had been paid by the Nabob, or received from him.—Being asked, +Whether it is not his opinion that the Nabob has paid more than twelve +per cent for money due since the 1st of August, 1774? he said, He has +heard that he has, but he does not know it.—Being asked, Whether he has +been told so by any considerable and weighty authority, that was like to +know? he said, He has been so informed by persons who he believes had a +very good opportunity of knowing it.—Being asked, Whether he was ever +told so by the Nabob of Arcot himself? he said, He does not recollect +that the Nabob of Arcot directly told him so, but from what he said he +did infer that he paid a higher interest than twelve per cent.</p> + +<p>Mr. Smith being asked, Whether, in the course of trade, he ever sold +anything to the Nabob of Arcot? he said, In the year 1775 he did sell to +the Nabob of Arcot pearls to the amount of 32,500 pagodas, for which the +Nabob gave him an order or tankah on the country of Tanjore, payable in +six months, without interest.—Being asked, Whether, at the time he +asked the Nabob his price for the pearls, the Nabob beat down that +price, as dealers commonly do? he said, No; so far from it, he offered +him more than he asked by 1000 pagodas, and which he rejected.—Being +asked, Whether, in settling a transaction of discount with the Nabob's +agent, he was not offered a greater discount than 12<i>l</i>. per cent? he +said, In discounting a soucar's bill for 180,000 pagodas, the Nabob's +agent did offer him a discount of twenty-four per cent per annum, saving +that it was the usual rate of discount paid by the Nabob; but which he +would not accept of, thinking himself confined by <a name="Page_119" id="Page_119" title="119" class="pagenum"></a>the act of Parliament +limiting the interest of moneys to twelve per cent, and accordingly he +discounted the bill at twelve per cent per annum only.—Being asked, +Whether he does not think those offers were made him because the Nabob +thought he was a person of some consequence in the settlement? he said, +Being only a private merchant, he apprehends that the offer was made to +him more from its being a general practice than from any opinion of his +importance.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<h3><a name="No_3" id="No_3" />No. 3.<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%">Referred to from p. <a href="#Page_38">38</a>.</span><br /> +<br /> +<i>A Bill for the Better Government of the Territorial Possessions and<br /> +Dependencies in India</i>.<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%">[ONE OF MR FOX'S INDIA BILLS.]</span></h3> + + +<p>And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid, that the Nabob of +Arcot, the Rajah of Tanjore, or any other native protected prince in +India, shall not assign, mortgage, or pledge any territory or land +whatsoever, or the produce or revenue thereof, to any British subject +whatsoever; neither shall it be lawful to and for any British subject +whatsoever to take or receive any such assignment, mortgage, or pledge; +and the same are hereby declared to be null and void; and all payments +or deliveries of produce or revenue, under any such assignment, shall +and may be recovered back, by such native prince paying or delivering +the same, from the person or persons receiving the same, or his or their +representatives.<a name="Page_120" id="Page_120" title="120" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<h3><a name="No_4" id="No_4" />No. 4.<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%">Referred to from pp. <a href="#Page_64">64</a> and <a href="#Page_73">73</a>.</span><br /> +<br /> +(COPY.)</h3> + +<p class="quotdate">27th May, 1782.</p> + +<div class="blockquote"><p><i>Letter from the Committee of Assigned Revenue, to the President and +Select Committee, dated 27th May, 1782; with Comparative Statement, and +Minute thereon.</i></p></div> + + +<div class="blockquote"><p>To the Right Honorable LORD MACARTNEY, K.B., President, and Governor, +&c., Select Committee of Fort St. George.</p></div> + +<p>MY LORD, AND GENTLEMEN,—</p> + +<p>Although we have, in obedience to your commands of the 5th January, +regularly laid before you our proceedings at large, and have +occasionally addressed you upon such points as required your resolutions +or orders for our guidance, we still think it necessary to collect and +digest in a summary report those transactions in the management of the +assigned revenue which have principally engaged our attention, and +which, upon the proceeding, are too much intermixed with ordinary +occurrences to be readily traced and understood.</p> + +<p>Such a report may be formed with the greater propriety at this time, +when your Lordship, &c., have been pleased to conclude your arrangements +for the rent of several of the Nabob's districts. Our aim in it is +briefly to explain the state of the Carnatic at the period of the +Nabob's assignment,—the particular causes which existed to the +prejudice of that assignment, after it was made,—and the measures which +<a name="Page_121" id="Page_121" title="121" class="pagenum"></a>your Lordship, &c., have, upon our recommendation, adopted for removing +those causes, and introducing a more regular and beneficial system of +management in the country.</p> + +<p>Hyder Ali having entered the Carnatic with his whole force, about the +middle of July, 1780, and employed fire and sword in its destruction for +near eighteen months before the Nabob's assignment took place, it will +not be difficult to conceive the state of the country at that period. In +those provinces which were fully exposed to the ravages of horse, scarce +a vestige remained either of population or agriculture: such of the +miserable inhabitants as escaped the fury of the sword were either +carried into the Mysore country or left to struggle under the horrors of +famine. The Arcot and Trichinopoly districts began early to feel the +effects of this desolating war. Tinnevelly, Madura, and Ramnadaporum, +though little infested with Hyder's troops, became a prey to the +incursions of the Polygars, who stripped them of the greatest part of +the revenues. Ongole, Nellore, and Palnaud, the only remaining +districts, had suffered, but in a small degree.</p> + +<p>The misfortunes of war, however, were not the only evils which the +Carnatic experienced. The Nabob's aumildars, and other servants, appear +to have taken advantage of the general confusion to enrich themselves. A +very small part of the revenue was accounted for; and so high were the +ordinary expenses of every district, that double the apparent produce of +the whole country would not have satisfied them.</p> + +<p>In this state, which we believe is no way exaggerated, the Company took +charge of the assigned countries. Their prospect of relief from the +heavy burdens of the <a name="Page_122" id="Page_122" title="122" class="pagenum"></a>war was, indeed, but little advanced by the +Nabob's concession; and the revenues of the Carnatic seemed in danger of +being irrecoverably lost, unless a speedy and entire change of system +could be adopted.</p> + +<p>On our minutes of the 21st January we treated the subject of the +assignment at some length, and pointed out the mischiefs which, in +addition to the effects of the war, had arisen from what we conceived to +be wrong and oppressive management. We used the freedom to suggest an +entire alteration in the mode of realizing the revenues. We proposed a +considerable and immediate reduction of expenses, and a total change of +the principal aumildars who had been employed under the Nabob.</p> + +<p>Our ideas had the good fortune to receive your approbation; but the +removal of the Nabob's servants being thought improper at that +particular period of the collections, we employed our attention chiefly +in preserving what revenue was left the country, and acquiring such +materials as might lead to a more perfect knowledge of its former and +present state.</p> + +<p>These pursuits, as we apprehended, met with great obstructions from the +conduct of the Nabob's servants. The orders they received were evaded +under various pretexts; no attention was paid to the strong and repeated +applications made to them for the accounts of their management; and +their attachment to the Company's interest appeared, in every instance, +so feeble, that we saw no prospect whatever of success, but in the +appointment of renters under the Company's sole authority.</p> + +<p>Upon this principle, we judged it expedient to recommend that such of +the Nabob's districts as were in a state to be farmed out might be +immediately let <a name="Page_123" id="Page_123" title="123" class="pagenum"></a>by a public advertisement, issued in the Company's +name, and circulated through every province of the Carnatic; and, with +the view of encouraging bidders, we proposed that the countries might be +advertised for the whole period of the Nabob's assignment, and the +security of the Company's protection promised in the fullest manner to +such persons as might become renters.</p> + +<p>This plan had the desired effect; and the attempts which were secretly +made to counteract it afforded an unequivocal proof of its necessity: +but the advantages resulting from it were more pleasingly evinced by the +number of proposals that were delivered, and by the terms which were in +general offered for the districts intended to be farmed out.</p> + +<p>Having so far attained the purposes of the assignment, our attention was +next turned to the heavy expenses entailed upon the different provinces; +and here, we confess, our astonishment was raised to the highest pitch. +In the Trichinopoly country the standing disbursements appeared, by the +Nabob's own accounts, to be one lac of rupees more than the receipts. In +other districts the charges were not in so high a proportion, but still +rated on a most extravagant scale; and we saw, by every account that was +brought before us, the absolute necessity of retrenching considerably in +all the articles of expense.</p> + +<p>Our own reason, aided by such inquiries as we were able to make, +suggested the alterations we have recommended to your Lordship, &c., +under this head. You will observe that we have not acted sparingly, but +we chose rather, in cases of doubt, to incur the hazard of retrenching +too much than too little; because it would be easier, after any stated +allowance <a name="Page_124" id="Page_124" title="124" class="pagenum"></a>for expenses, to add what might be necessary than to +diminish. We hope, however, there will be no material increase in the +articles, as they now stand.</p> + +<p>One considerable charge upon the Nabob's country was for extraordinary +sibbendies, sepoys, and horsemen, who appeared to us to be a very +unnecessary incumbrance on the revenue. Your Lordship, &c., have +determined to receive such of these people as will enlist into the +Company's service, and discharge the rest. This measure will not only +relieve the country of a heavy burden, but tend greatly to fix in the +Company that kind of authority which is requisite for the due collection +of the revenues.</p> + +<p>In consequence of your determination respecting the Nabob's sepoys, &c., +every charge under that head has been struck out of our account of +expenses. If the whole number of these people be enlisted by the +Company, there will probably be no more than sufficient to complete +their ordinary military establishment. But should the present reduction +of the Nabob's artillery render it expedient, after the war, to make any +addition to the Company's establishment for the purposes of the assigned +countries, the expense of such addition, whatever it be, must be +deducted from the present account of savings.</p> + +<p>In considering the charges of the several districts, in order to +establish better regulations, we were careful to discriminate those +incurred for troops, kept or supposed to be kept up for the defence of +the country, from those of the sibbendy, servants, &c., for the +cultivation of the lands and the collection of the revenues, as well as +to pay attention, to such of the established customs of the country, +ancient privileges of the inhabitants, and public charities, as were +neces<a name="Page_125" id="Page_125" title="125" class="pagenum"></a>sarily allowed, and appeared proper to be continued, but which, +under the Nabob's government, were not only rated much higher, but had +been blended under one confused and almost unintelligible title of +expenses of the districts: so joined, perhaps, to afford pleas and means +of secreting and appropriating great part of the revenues to other +purposes than fairly appeared; and certainly betraying the utmost +neglect and mismanagement, as giving latitude for every species of fraud +and oppression. Such a system has, in the few latter years of the +Nabob's necessities, brought all his countries into that situation from +which nothing but the most rigid economy, strict observance of the +conduct of managers, and the most conciliating attention to the rights +of the inhabitants can possibly recover them.</p> + +<p>It now only remains for us to lay before your Lordship, &c., the +inclosed statement of the sums at which the districts lately advertised +have been let, compared with the accounts of their produce delivered by +the Nabob, and entered on our proceedings of the 21st January,—likewise +a comparative view of the former and present expenses.</p> + +<p>The Nabob's accounts of the produce of these districts state, as we have +some reason to think, the sums which former renters engaged to pay to +him, (and which were seldom, if ever, made good,) and not the sums +actually produced by the districts; yet we have the satisfaction to +observe that the present aggregate rents, upon an average, are equal to +those accounts. Your Lordship, &c., cannot, indeed, expect, that, in the +midst of the danger, invasion, and distress which assail the Carnatic on +every side, the renters now appointed will be able at present to ful<a name="Page_126" id="Page_126" title="126" class="pagenum"></a>fil +the terms of their leases; but we trust, from the measures we have +taken, that very little, if any, of the actual collections will be lost, +even during the war,—and that, on the return of peace and tranquillity, +the renters will have it in their power fully to perform their +respective agreements.</p> + +<p>We much regret that the situation of the Arcot province will not admit +of the same settlement which has been made for the other districts; but +the enemy being in possession of the capital, together with several +other strongholds, and having entirely desolated the country, there is +little room to hope for more from it than a bare subsistence to the few +garrisons we have left there.</p> + +<p>We shall not fail to give our attention towards obtaining every +information respecting this province that the present times will permit, +and to take the first opportunity to propose such arrangements for the +management as we may think eligible.</p> + +<p class="noindent">We have the honor to be</p> + +<p class="noindent">Your most obedient humble servants,</p> + +<p class="noindent"> +CHARLES OAKLEY,<br /> +EYLES IRWIN,<br /> +HALL PLUMER,<br /> +DAVID HALIBURTON,<br /> +GEORGE MOUBRAY.<br /> +</p> + +<p class="noindent">FORT ST. GEORGE, 27th May, 1782.</p> + +<p class="noindent">A true copy.</p> + +<p class="noindent">J. HUDLESTON, Sec.<a name="Page_127" id="Page_127" title="127" class="pagenum"></a></p> + + +<p>COMPARATIVE STATEMENT <i>of the Revenues and Expenses of the Nellore, +Ongole, Palnaud, Trichinopoly, Madura, and Tinnevelly Countries, while +in the Hands of the Nabob, with those of the same Countries on the Terms +of the Leases lately granted for Four Years, to commence with the +Beginning of the Phazeley, 1192, or the 12th July, 1782. Abstracted from +the Accounts received from the Nabob, and from the Rents stipulated for +and Expenses allowed by the present Leases</i>.</p> + + + +<table border="0" cellpadding="1" cellspacing="0" summary=""> +<tr><td align='center' colspan='2'><b>GROSS REVENUE.</b></td><td align='center' colspan='3'><b>EXPENSES.</b></td><td align='center' colspan='3'><b>NET REVENUE.</b></td></tr> +<tr><td align='center'></td><td align='center'>Annual Gross Rent by the Nabob's Account.<br /> Average of the Four Years immediately preceding the present War.</td> +<td align='center'>Annual Rent by the present Leases, at an Average of Four Years.</td> +<td align='center'>Annual Expenses by the Nabob's Accounts.</td> +<td align='center'>Annual Expenses allowed by the present Leases at an Estimate.</td> +<td align='center'>Reduction in the Annual Expenses.</td> +<td align='center'>Net Revenue by the Nabob's Accounts.</td> +<td align='center'>Net Revenue by the present Leases.</td><td align='center'>Increase of Net Revenue.</td></tr> +<tr><td> </td><td align='center'>Star Pagodas.</td><td align='center'>Star Pagodas.</td><td align='center'>Star Pagodas.</td><td align='center'>Star Pagodas.</td><td align='center'>Star Pagodas.</td><td align='center'>Star Pagodas.</td><td align='center'>Star Pagodas.</td><td align='center'>Star Pagodas. </td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>Nellore and Sarapilly</td><td align='right'>3,22,830</td><td align='right'>3,61,900</td><td align='right'>1,98,794</td><td align='right'>33,000</td><td align='right'>1,65,794</td><td align='right'>1,24,036</td><td align='right'>3,28,900</td><td align='right'>2,04,864</td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>Ongole</td><td align='right'>1,10,967<a name="FNanchor_68_68" id="FNanchor_68_68"></a><a href="#Footnote_68_68" class="fnanchor" title=" In this statement, the Ongole country, though it is +included under the head of gross revenue, has been let for a certain +sum, exclusive of charges. If the expenses specified in the Nabob's +vassool accounts for this district are added, the present gross revenue +even would appear to exceed the Nabob's; and as the country is only let +for one year, there may hereafter be an increase of its revenue.">[68]</a></td><td align='right'>55,000</td><td align='right'>88,254</td><td align='right'>...</td><td align='right'>88,254</td><td align='right'>22,713</td><td align='right'>55,000</td><td align='right'>32,287</td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>Palnaud</td><td align='right'>51,355</td><td align='right'>53,500</td><td align='right'>25,721</td><td align='right'>5,698</td><td align='right'>20,023</td><td align='right'>25,634</td><td align='right'>47,802</td><td align='right'>22,168</td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>Trichinopoly</td><td align='right'>2,89,993<a name="FNanchor_69_69" id="FNanchor_69_69"></a><a href="#Footnote_69_69" class="fnanchor" title=" The Trichinopoly countries let for the above sum, +exclusive of the expenses of sibbendy and saderwared, amounting, by the +Nabob's accounts, to rupees 1,30,00 per annum, which are to be defrayed +by the renter. And the jaghires of Amir-ul-Omrah and the Begum are not +included in the present lease.">[69]</a></td><td align='right'>2,73,214</td><td align='right'>2,82,148</td><td align='right'>13,143</td><td align='right'>2,63,005</td><td align='right'>7,845</td><td align='right'>2,54,071</td><td align='right'>2,46,226 </td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>Madura</td><td align='right'>1,02,756</td><td align='right'>60,290</td><td align='right'>63,710</td><td align='right'>12,037</td><td align='right'>51,673</td><td align='right'>39,046</td><td align='right'>48,253</td><td align='right'>9,207 </td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>Tinnevelly</td><td align='right'>5,65,537</td><td align='right'>5,79,713</td><td align='right'>1,64,098</td><td align='right'>70,368</td><td align='right'>93,730</td><td align='right'>4,01,439</td><td align='right'>5,09,345</td><td align='right'>1,07,906</td><td align='right'></td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'></td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>Total</td><td align='right'>14,43,438</td><td align='right'>13,83,617</td><td align='right'>8,22,725</td><td align='right'>1,40,246</td><td align='right'>6,82,479</td><td align='right'>6,20,713</td><td align='right'>12,43,371</td><td align='right'>6,22,658</td><td align='right'></td></tr></table> + + +<p>N.B. In this statement, Madras Pagodas are calculated at 10 per cent +Batta; Chuckrums at two thirds of a Porto Novo Pagoda, which are +reckoned at 115 per 100 Star Pagodas; and Rupees at 350 per 100 Star +Pagodas. To avoid fractions, the nearest integral numbers have been +taken.</p> + + +<p>Signed,</p> + +<p class="noindent"> +CHARLES OAKLEY,<br /> +EYLES IRWIN,<br /> +HALL PLUMER,<br /> +DAVID HALIBURTON,<br /> +GEORGE MOUBRAY.<br /> +<br /> +FORT ST. GEORGE, 27th May, 1782.<br /> +<a name="Page_128" id="Page_128" title="128" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<h3><a name="No_5" id="No_5" />No. 5.<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%">Referred to from p. <a href="#Page_73">73</a>.</span><br /> +<br /> +<i>Case of certain Persons renting the Assigned Lands wider the Authority +of the East India Company.</i><br /> +<br /> +Extract of a Letter from the President and Council of Fort St. George, +25th May, 1783.</h3> + + +<p>One of them [the renters], Ram Chunder Raus, was, indeed, one of those +unfortunate rajahs whose country, <i>by being near to the territories of +the Nabob</i>, forfeited its title to independence, and became the prey of +ambition and cupidity. This man, though not able to resist the Company's +arms, <i>employed in such a deed at the Nabob's instigation</i>, had industry +and ability. He acquired, <i>by a series of services</i>, even the confidence +of the Nabob, who suffered him to <i>rent apart of the country of which he +had deprived him of the property</i>. This man had afforded no motive for +his rejection by the Nabob, but that of being ready to engage with the +Company: a motive most powerful, indeed, but not to be avowed.</p> + +<p>[This is the person whom the English instruments of the Nabob of Arcot +have had the audacity to charge with a corrupt transaction with Lord +Macartney, and, in support of that charge, to produce a forged letter +from his Lordship's steward. The charge and letter the reader may see in +this Appendix, under the proper head. It is asserted by the unfortunate +prince above mentioned, that the Company first settled on the coast of +Coromandel under the protection of one of his ancestors. If this be +true, (and it is far <a name="Page_129" id="Page_129" title="129" class="pagenum"></a> +from unlikely,) the world must judge of the return +the descendant has met with. The case of another of the victims given up +by the ministry, though not altogether so striking as the former, is +worthy of attention. It is that of the renter of the Province of +Nellore.]</p> + +<p>It is, with a wantonness of falsehood, and indifference to detection, +asserted to you, in proof of the validity of the Nabob's objections, +that this man's failures had already forced us to remove him: though in +fact he has continued invariably in office; though our <i>greatest +supplies have been received from him</i>; and that, in the disappointment +of your remittances [the remittances from Bengal] and of other +resources, the specie sent us <i>from Nellore alone</i> has sometimes enabled +us to carry on the public business; and that the <i>present expedition +against the French</i> must, without <i>this</i> assistance from the assignment, +have been laid aside, or delayed until it might have become too late.</p> + +<p>[This man is by the ministry given over to the mercy of persons capable +of making charges on him "<i>with a wantonness of falsehood, and +indifference to detection</i>." What is likely to happen to him and the +rest of the victims may appear by the following.]</p> + +<hr style='width: 25%;' /> + +<h3><i>Letter to the Governor-General and Council, March 13th, 1782.</i></h3> + +<p>The speedy termination, to which the people were taught to look, of the +Company's interference in the revenues, and the vengeance denounced +against those who, contrary to the mandate of the Durbar, should be +connected with them, as reported by Mr. Sullivan, <a name="Page_130" id="Page_130" title="130" class="pagenum"></a>may, as much as the +former exactions and oppressions of the Nabob in the revenue, as +reported by the commander-in-chief, have deterred some of the fittest +men from offering to be concerned in it.</p> + +<p>The timid disposition of the Hindoo natives of this country was not +likely to be insensible to the specimen of that vengeance given by his +Excellency the Amir, who, upon the mere rumor, that a Bramin, of the +name of Appagee Row, had given proposals to the Company for the +rentership of Vellore, had the temerity to send for him, and to put him +in confinement.</p> + +<p>A man thus seized by the Nabob's sepoys within the walls of Madras gave +a general alarm, and government found it necessary to promise the +protection of the Company, in order to calm the apprehensions of the +people.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3><a name="No_6" id="No_6" />No. 6.<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%">Referred to from pp. <a href="#Page_101">101</a> and <a href="#Page_105">105</a>.</span><br /> +<br /> +<i>Extract of a Letter from the Council and Select Committee at Fort St. +George, to the Governor-General and Council, dated 25th May, 1783.</i></h3> + + +<p>In the prosecution of our duty, we beseech you to consider, as an act of +strict and necessary justice, previous to reiteration of your orders for +the surrender of the assignment, how far it would be likely to affect +third persons who do not appear to have committed any breach of their +engagements. You command us to compel our aumils to deliver over their +respective <a name="Page_131" id="Page_131" title="131" class="pagenum"></a>charges as shall be appointed by the Nabob, or to retain +their trust under his sole authority, if he shall choose to confirm +them. These aumils are really renters; they were appointed in the room +of the Nabob's aumils, and contrary to his wishes; they have already +been rejected by him, and are therefore not likely to be confirmed by +him. They applied to this government, in consequence of public +advertisements in our name, as possessing in this instance the joint +authority of the Nabob and the Company, and have entered into mutual and +strict covenants with us, and we with them, relative to the certain +districts not actually in the possession of the enemy; by which +covenants, as they are bound to the punctual payment of their rents and +due management of the country, so we, and our constituents, and the +public faith, are in like manner bound to maintain them in the enjoyment +of their leases, during the continuance of the term. That term was for +five years, agreeably to the words of the assignment, which declare that +the time of renting shall be for three or five years, as the Governor +shall settle with the renters.—Their leases cannot be legally torn from +them. Nothing but their previous breach of a part could justify our +breach of the whole. Such a stretch and abuse of power would, indeed, +not only savor of the assumption of sovereignty, but of arbitrary and +oppressive despotism. In the present contest, whether the Nabob be +guilty, or we be guilty, the renters are not guilty. Whichever of the +contending parties has broken the condition of the assignment, the +renters have not broken the condition of their leases. These men, in +conducting the business of the assignment, have acted in opposition to +the designs of the Nabob, in despite of <a name="Page_132" id="Page_132" title="132" class="pagenum"></a>the menaces denounced against +all who should dare to oppose the mandates of the Durbar justice. +Gratitude and humanity require that provision should be made by you, +before you set the Nabob's ministers loose on the country, for the +protection of the victims devoted to their vengeance.</p> + +<p>Mr. Benfield, to secure the permanency of his power, and the perfection +of his schemes, thought it necessary to render the Nabob an absolute +stranger to the state of his affairs. He assured his Highness that full +justice was not done to the strength of his sentiments and the keenness +of his attacks, in the translations that were made by the Company's +servants from the original Persian of his letters. He therefore proposed +to him that they should for the future be transmitted in English.—Of +the English language or writing his Highness or the Amir cannot read one +word, though the latter can converse in it with sufficient fluency. The +Persian language, as the language of the Mahomedan conquerors, and of +the court of Delhi, as an appendage or signal of authority, was at all +times particularly affected by the Nabob. It is the language of all acts +of state, and all public transactions, among the Mussulman chiefs of +Hindostan. The Nabob thought to have gained no inconsiderable point, in +procuring the correspondence from our predecessors to the Rajah of +Tanjore to be changed from the Mahratta language, which that Hindoo +prince understands, to the Persian, which he disclaims understanding. To +force the Rajah to the Nabob's language was gratifying the latter with a +new species of subserviency. He had formerly contended with considerable +anxiety, and, it was thought, no inconsiderable cost, for particular +<a name="Page_133" id="Page_133" title="133" class="pagenum"></a>forms of address to be used towards him in that language. But all of a +sudden, in favor of Mr. Benfield, he quits his former affections, his +habits, his knowledge, his curiosity, the increasing mistrust of age, to +throw himself upon the generous candor, the faithful interpretation, the +grateful return, and eloquent organ of Mr. Benfield!—<i>Mr. Benfield +relates and reads what he pleases to his Excellency the Amir-ul-Omrah; +his Excellency communicates with the Nabob, his father, in the language +the latter understands. Through two channels so pure, the truth must +arrive at the Nabob in perfect refinement; through this double trust, +his Highness receives whatever impression it may be convenient to make +on him: he abandons his signature to whatever paper they tell him +contains, in the English language, the sentiments with which they had +inspired him. He thus is surrounded on every side. He is totally at +their mercy, to believe what is not true, and to subscribe to what he +does not mean. There is no system so new, so foreign to his intentions, +that they may not pursue in his name, without possibility of detection: +for they are cautious of who approach him, and have thought prudent to +decline, for him, the visits of the Governor</i>, even upon the usual +solemn and acceptable occasion of delivering to his Highness the +Company's letters. <i>Such is the complete ascendency gained by Mr. +Benfield.</i> It may be partly explained by the facts observed already, +some years ago, by Mr. Benfield himself, in regard to the Nabob, of the +infirmities natural to his advanced age, joined to the decays of his +constitution. To this ascendency, in proportion as it grew, must chiefly +be ascribed, if not the origin, at least the continuance and increase, +of the Nabob's disunion with this Presidency: a dis<a name="Page_134" id="Page_134" title="134" class="pagenum"></a>union which creates +the importance and subserves the resentments of Mr. Benfield; <i>and an +ascendency which, if you effect the surrender of the assignment, will +entirely leave the exercise of power and accumulation of fortune at his +boundless discretion: to him, and to the Amir-ul-Omrah, and to Seyd +Assam Cawn, the assignment would in fact be surrendered. HE WILL (IF +ANY) BE THE SOUCAR SECURITY; and security in this country is +counter-secured by possession. You would not choose to take the +assignment from the Company, to give it to individuals</i>. Of the +impropriety of its returning to the Nabob, Mr. Benfield would now again +argue from his former observations, that, under his Highness's +management, his country declined, his people emigrated, his revenues +decreased, and his country was rapidly approaching to a state of +political insolvency. Of Seyd Assam Cawn we judge only from the +observations this letter already contains. But of the other two persons +[Amir-ul-Omrah and Mr. Benfield] we undertake to declare, not as parties +in a cause, or even as voluntary witnesses, but as executive officers, +reporting to you, in the discharge of our duty, and under the impression +of the sacred obligation which binds us to truth, as well as to justice, +that, from every observation of their principles and dispositions, and +every information of their character and conduct, they have prosecuted +projects to the injury and danger of the Company and individuals; <i>that +it would be improper to trust, and dangerous to employ them, in any +public or important situation; that the tranquillity of the Carnatic +requires a restraint to the power of the Amir; and that the Company, +whose service and protection Mr. Benfield has repeatedly and recently +forfeited, would be more secure against danger <a name="Page_135" id="Page_135" title="135" class="pagenum"></a>and confusion, if he +were removed from their several Presidencies.</i></p> + +<p>[After the above solemn declaration from so weighty an authority, the +principal object of that awful and deliberate warning, instead of being +"removed from the several Presidencies," is licensed to return to one of +the principal of those Presidencies, and the grand theatre of the +operations on account of which the Presidency recommends his total +removal. The reason given is, for the accommodation of that very debt +which has been the chief instrument of his dangerous practices, and the +main cause of all the confusions in the Company's government.]</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<h3><a name="No_7" id="No_7" />No. 7.<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%">Referred to from pp. <a href="#Page_82">82</a>, <a href="#Page_88">88</a>, and <a href="#Page_89">89</a>.</span><br /> +<br /> +<i>Extracts from the Evidence of Mr. Petrie, late Resident for the Company +at Tanjore, given to the Select Committee, relative to the Revenues and +State of the Country, &c., &c.</i></h3> + + +<p class="quotdate">9th May, 1782.</p> + +<p>William Petrie, Esq., attending according to order, was asked, In what +station he was in the Company's service? he said, He went to India in +the year 1765, a writer upon the Madras establishment: he was employed, +during the former war with Hyder Ali, in the capacity of paymaster and +commissary to part of the army, and was afterwards paymaster and +commissary to the army in the first siege of Tanjore, and the +<a name="Page_136" id="Page_136" title="136" class="pagenum"></a>subsequent campaigns; then secretary to the Secret Department from 1772 +to 1775; he came to England in 1775, and returned again to Madras the +beginning of 1778; he was resident at the durbar of the Rajah of Tanjore +from that time to the month of May; and from that time to January, 1780, +was chief of Nagore and Carrical, the first of which was received from +the Rajah of Tanjore, and the second was taken from the French.—Being +asked, Who sent him to Tanjore? he said, Sir Thomas Rumbold, and the +Secret Committee.—Being then asked, Upon what errand? he said, He went +first up with a letter from the Company to the Rajah of Tanjore: he was +directed to give the Rajah the strongest assurances that he should be +kept in possession of his country, and every privilege to which he had +been restored; he was likewise directed to negotiate with the Rajah of +Tanjore for the cession of the seaport and district of Nagore in lieu of +the town and district of Devicotta, which he had promised to Lord Pigot: +these were the principal, and, to the best of his recollection at +present, the only objects in view, when he was first sent up to Tanjore. +In the course of his stay at Tanjore, other matters of business occurred +between the Company and the Rajah, which came under his management as +resident at that durbar.—Being asked, Whether the Rajah did deliver up +to him the town and the annexed districts of Nagore voluntarily, or +whether he was forced to it? he said, When he made the first proposition +to the Rajah, agreeable to the directions he had received from the +Secret Committee at Madras, in the most free, open, and liberal manner, +the Rajah told him the seaport of Nagore was entirely at the service of +his benefactors, the Company, and that he <a name="Page_137" id="Page_137" title="137" class="pagenum"></a>was happy in having that +opportunity of testifying his gratitude to them. These may be supposed +to be words of course; but, from every experience which he had of the +Rajah's mind and conduct, whilst he was at Tanjore, he has reason to +believe that his declarations of gratitude to the Company were perfectly +sincere. He speaks to the town of Nagore at present, and a certain +district,—not of the districts to the amount of which they afterwards +received. The Rajah asked him, To what amount he expected a jaghire to +the Company? And the witness further said, That he acknowledged to the +committee that he was not instructed upon that head; that he wrote for +orders to Madras, and was directed to ask the Rajah for a jaghire to a +certain amount; that this gave rise to a long negotiation, the Rajah +representing to him his inability to make such a gift to the Company as +the Secret Committee at Madras seemed to expect; while he (the witness) +on the other hand, was directed to make as good a bargain as he could +for the Company. From the view that he then took of the Rajah's +finances, from the situation of his country, and from the load of debt +which pressed hard upon him, he believes he at different times, in his +correspondence with the government, represented the necessity of their +being moderate in their demands, and it was at last agreed to accept of +the town of Nagore, valued at a certain annual revenue, and a jaghire +annexed to the town, the whole amounting to 250,000 rupees.—Being +asked, Whether it did turn out so valuable? he said, He had not a doubt +but it would turn out more, as it was let for more than that to farmers +at Madras, if they had managed the districts properly; <i>but they were +strangers to the manners and <a name="Page_138" id="Page_138" title="138" class="pagenum"></a>customs of the people; when they came +down, they oppressed the inhabitants, and threw the whole district into +confusion; the inhabitants, many of them, left the country, and deserted +the cultivation of their lands; of course the farmers were disappointed +of their collections, and they have since failed, and the Company have +lost a considerable part of what the farmers were to pay for the +jaghire</i>.—Being asked, Who these farmers were? he said, One of them was +the renter of the St. Thomé district, near Madras, and the other, and +the most responsible, was a Madras dubash.—Being asked, Whom he was +dubash to? he said, To Mr. Cass-major.</p> + +<p>Being asked, Whether the lease was made upon higher terms than the +district was rated to him by the Rajah? he said, It was.—Being then +asked, What reason was assigned why the district was not kept under the +former management by aumildars, or let to persons in the Tanjore country +acquainted with the district? he said, No reasons were assigned: he was +directed from Madras to advertise them to be let to persons of the +country; but before he received any proposal, he received accounts that +they were let at Madras, in consequence of public advertisements which +had been made there: he believes, indeed, there were very few men in +those districts responsible enough to have been intrusted with the +management of those lands.—Being asked, Whether, at the time he was +authorized to negotiate for Nagore in the place of Devicotta, Devicotta +was given up to the Rajah? he said, No.—Being asked, Whether the Rajah +of Tanjore did not frequently desire that the districts of Arnee and +Hanamantagoody should be restored to him, agreeable to treaty, and the +Company's orders <a name="Page_139" id="Page_139" title="139" class="pagenum"></a>to Lord Pigot? he said, Many a time; and he +transmitted his representations regularly to Madras.—Being then asked, +Whether those places were restored to him? he said, Not while he was in +India.</p> + +<p>Being asked, Whether he was not authorized and required by the +Presidency at Madras to demand a large sum of money over and above the +four lacs of pagodas that were to be annually paid by a grant of the +Rajah, made in the time of Lord Pigot? he said, He was: to the amount, +he believes, of four lacs of pagodas, commonly known by the name of +deposit-money.—Being asked, Whether the Rajah did not frequently plead +his inability to pay that money? he said, He did every time he mentioned +it, and complained loudly of the demand.—Being asked, Whether he thinks +those complaints were well founded? he says, He thinks the Rajah of +Tanjore was not only not in a state of ability to pay the deposit-money, +but that the annual payment of four lacs of pagodas was more than his +revenues could afford.—Being asked, Whether he was not frequently +obliged to borrow money, in order to pay the instalments of the annual +payments, and such parts as he paid of the deposit? he said, Yes, he +was.—Being asked, Where he borrowed the money? he said, He believes +principally from soucars or native bankers, and some at Madras, as he +told him.—Being asked, Whether he told him that his credit was very +good, and that he borrowed upon moderate interest? he said, That he told +him he found great difficulties in raising money, and was obliged to +borrow at a most exorbitant interest, even some of it at forty-eight per +cent, and he believes not a great deal under it. <i>He desired him (the +witness) to speak to one of the soucars or bankers at Tanjore to +accommo<a name="Page_140" id="Page_140" title="140" class="pagenum"></a>date him with a loan of money: that man showed him an account +between him and the Rajah, from which it appeared that he charged +forty-eight per cent, besides compound interest</i>.—Being asked, Whether +the sums duo were large? he said, Yes, they were considerable; though he +does not recollect the amount.—Being asked, Whether the banker lent the +money? he said, He would not, unless the witness could procure him +payment of his old arrears.</p> + +<p>Being asked, What notice did the government of Madras take of the king +of Tanjore's representations of the state of his affairs, and his +inability to pay? he said, He does not recollect, that, in their +correspondence with him, there was any reasoning upon the subject; and +in his correspondence with Sir Thomas Rumbold, upon the amount of the +jaghire, he seemed very desirous of adapting the demand of government to +the Rajah's circumstances; but, whilst he stayed at Tanjore, the Rajah +was not exonerated from any part of his burdens.—Being asked, Whether +they ever desired the Rajah to make up a statement of his accounts, +disbursements, debts, and payments to the Company, in order to ascertain +whether the country was able to pay the increasing demands upon it? he +said, Through him he is certain they never did.—Being then asked, If he +ever heard whether they did through any one else? he said, He never did.</p> + +<p>Being asked, Whether the Rajah is not bound to furnish the cultivators +of land with seed for their crops, according to the custom of the +country? he said, <i>The king of Tanjore, as proprietor of the land, +always makes advances of money for seed for the cultivation of the +land.</i>—Being then asked, If money beyond his power of furnishing should +be extorted from <a name="Page_141" id="Page_141" title="141" class="pagenum"></a>him, might it not prevent, in the first instance, the +means of cultivating the country? he said, It certainly does; <i>he knows +it for a fact; and he knows, that, when he left the country, there were +several districts which were uncultivated from that cause</i>.—Being +asked, Whether it is not necessary to be at a considerable expense in +order to keep up the mounds and watercourses? he said, <i>A very +considerable one annually</i>.—Being asked, What would be the consequence, +if money should fail for that? he said, <i>In the first instance, the +country would be partially supplied with water, some districts would be +overflowed, and others would be parched</i>.—Being asked, Whether there is +not a considerable dam called the Anicut, on the keeping up of which the +prosperity of the country greatly depends, and which requires a great +expense? he said, Yes, there is: the whole of the Tanjore country is +admirably well supplied with water, nor can he conceive any method could +be fallen upon more happily adapted to the cultivation and prosperity of +the country; but, as the Anicut is the source of that prosperity, any +injury done to that must essentially affect all the other works in the +country: it is a most stupendous piece of masonry, but, from the very +great floods, frequently requiring repairs, which if neglected, not only +the expense of repairing must be greatly increased, but a general injury +done to the whole country.—Being asked, Whether that dam has been kept +in as good preservation since the prevalence of the English government +as before? he said, From his own knowledge he cannot tell, but from +everything he has read or heard of the former prosperity and opulence of +the kings of Tanjore, he should suppose not.—Being asked, Whether he +does not <a name="Page_142" id="Page_142" title="142" class="pagenum"></a>know of several attempts that have been made to prevent the +repair, and even to damage the work? he said, The Rajah himself +frequently complained of that to him, and he has likewise heard it from +others at Tanjore.—Being asked, Who it was that attempted those acts of +violence? he said, He was told it was the inhabitants of the Nabob's +country adjoining to the Anicut.—Being asked, Whether they were not set +on or instigated by the Nabob? he answered, The Rajah said so.—And +being asked, What steps the President and Council took to punish the +authors and prevent those violences? he said, To the best of his +recollection, the Governor told him he would make inquiries into it, but +he does not know that any inquiries were made; that Sir Thomas Rumbold, +the Governor, informed him that he had laid his representations with +respect to the Anicut before the Nabob, who denied that his people had +given any interruption to the repairs of that work.</p> + +<hr style='width: 25%;' /> + +<p class="quotdate">10th May.</p> + +<p>Being asked, What he thinks the real clear receipt of the revenues of +Tanjore were worth when he left it? he said, He cannot say what was the +net amount, as he does not know the expense of the Rajah's collection; +but while he was at Tanjore, he understood from the Rajah himself, and +from his ministers, that the gross collection did not exceed nine lacs +of pagodas (360,000<i>l.</i>).—Being asked, Whether he thinks the country +could pay the eight lacs of pagodas which had been demanded to be paid +in the course of one year? he said, Clearly not.—Being asked, Whether +there was not an attempt made to remove the Rajah's minister, upon some +delay in payment of the deposit?<a name="Page_143" id="Page_143" title="143" class="pagenum"></a> he said, The Governor of Madras wrote +to that effect, which he represented to the Rajah.—Being asked, Who was +mentioned to succeed to the minister that then was, in case he should be +removed? he said, When Sir Hector Munro came afterwards to Tanjore, the +old daubiere was mentioned, and recommended to the Rajah as successor to +his then dewan.—Being asked, Of what age was the daubiere at that time? +he said, Of a very great age: upwards of fourscore.—Being asked, +Whether a person called Kanonga Saba Pilla was not likewise named? he +said, Yes, he was: he was recommended by Sir Thomas Rumbold; and one +recommendation, as well as I can recollect, went through me.—Being +asked, What was the reason of his being recommended? he said, He +undertook to pay off the Rajah's debts, and to give security for the +regular payment of the Rajah's instalments to the Company.—Being asked, +Whether he offered to give any security for preserving the country from +oppression, and for supporting the dignity of the Rajah and his people? +he said, He does not know that he did, or that it was asked of +him.—Being asked, Whether he was a person agreeable to the Rajah? he +said, He was not.—Being asked, Whether he was not a person who had fled +out of the country to avoid the resentment of the Rajah? he said, He +was.—Being asked, Whether he was not charged by the Rajah with +malpractices, and breach of trust relative to his effects? he said, He +was; but he told the Governor that he would account for his conduct, and +explain everything to the satisfaction of the Rajah.—Being asked, +Whether the Rajah did not consider this man as in the interest of his +enemies, and particularly of the Nabob of Arcot and Mr. Benfield? he +<a name="Page_144" id="Page_144" title="144" class="pagenum"></a>said, He does not recollect that he did mention that to him: he +remembers to have heard him complain of a transaction between Kanonga +Saba Pilla and Mr. Benfield; but he told him he had been guilty of a +variety of malpractices in his administration, that he had oppressed the +people, and defrauded him.—Being asked, In what branch of business the +Rajah had formerly employed him? he said, He was at one time, he +believes, renter of the whole country, was supposed to have great +influence with the Rajah, and was in fact dewan some time.—Being asked, +Whether the nomination of that man was not particularly odious to the +Rajah? he said, He found the Rajah's mind so exceedingly averse to that +man, that he believes he would almost as soon have submitted to his +being deposed as to submit to the nomination of that man to be his +prime-minister.</p> + +<hr style='width: 25%;' /> + +<p class="quotdate">13th May.</p> + +<p>Mr. Petrie being asked, Whether he was informed by the Rajah, or by +others, at Tanjore or Madras, that Mr. Benfield, whilst he managed the +revenues at Tanjore, during the usurpation of the Nabob, did not treat +the inhabitants with great rigor? he said, He did hear from the Rajah +that Mr. Benfield did treat the inhabitants with rigor during the time +he had anything to do with the administration of the revenues of +Tanjore.—Being asked, If he recollects in what particulars? he said, +The Rajah particularly complained that grain had been delivered out to +the inhabitants, for the purposes of cultivation, at a higher price than +the market price of grain in the country; he cannot say the actual +difference of price, but it struck him at the time as something very +consider<a name="Page_145" id="Page_145" title="145" class="pagenum"></a>able.—Being asked, Whether that money was all recovered from +the inhabitants? he said, The Rajah of Tanjore told him that the money +was all recovered from the inhabitants.—Being asked, Whether he did not +hear that the Nabob exacted from the country of Tanjore, whilst he was +in possession of it? he said, From the accounts which he received at +Tanjore of the revenues for a number of years past, it appeared that the +Nabob collected from the country, while he was in possession, rather +more than sixteen lacs of pagodas annually; whereas, when he was at +Tanjore, it did not yield more than nine lacs.—Being asked, From whence +that difference arose? he said, When Tanjore was conquered for the +Nabob, he has been told that many thousand of the native inhabitants +fled from the country, some into the country of Mysore, and others into +the dominions of the Mahrattas; he understood from the same authority, +that, while the Nabob was in possession of the country, many inhabitants +from the Carnatic, allured by the superior fertility and opulence of +Tanjore, and encouraged by the Nabob, took up their residence there, +which enabled the Nabob to cultivate the whole country; and upon the +restoration of the Rajah, he has heard that the Carnatic inhabitants +were carried back to their own country, which left a considerable blank +in the population, which was not replaced while he was there, +principally owing to an opinion which prevailed through the country that +the Rajah's government was not to be permanent, but that another +revolution was fast approaching. During the Nabob's government, the +price of grain was considerably higher (owing to a very unusual scarcity +in the Carnatic) than when he was in Tanjore.—Be<a name="Page_146" id="Page_146" title="146" class="pagenum"></a>ing asked, Whether he +was ever in the Marawar country? he said, Yes; he was commissary to the +army in that expedition.—Being asked, Whether that country was much +wasted by the war? he said, Plunder was not permitted to the army, nor +did the country suffer from its operations, except in causing many +thousands of the inhabitants, who had been employed in the cultivation +of the country, to leave it.—Being asked, Whether he knows what is done +with the palace and inhabitants of Ramnaut? he said, The town was taken +by storm, but not plundered by the troops; it was immediately delivered +up to the Nabob's eldest son.—Being asked, Whether great riches were +not supposed to be in that palace and temple? he said, It was +universally believed so.—Being asked, What account was given of them? +he said, He cannot tell; everything remained in the possession of the +Nabob.—Being asked, What became of the children and women of the family +of the prince of that country? he said, The Rajah was a minor; the +government was in the hands of the Ranny, his mother: from general +report he has heard they were carried to Trichinopoly, and placed in +confinement there.—Being asked, Whether he perceived any difference in +the face of the Carnatic when he first knew it and when he last knew it? +he said, He thinks he did, particularly in its population.—Being asked, +Whether it was better or worse? he said, It was not so populous.—Being +asked, What is the condition of the Nabob's eldest son? he said, He was +in the Black Town of Madras, when he left the country.—Being asked, +Whether he was entertained there in a manner suitable to his birth and +expectations? he said, No: he lived there without any of those ex<a name="Page_147" id="Page_147" title="147" class="pagenum"></a>terior +marks of splendor which princes of his rank in India are particularly +fond of.—Being asked, Whether he has not heard that his appointments +were poor and mean? he said, He has heard that they were not equal to +his rank and expectations.—Being asked, Whether he had any share in the +government? he said, He believes none: for some years past the Nabob has +delegated most of the powers of government to his second son.—Being +asked, Whether the Rajah did not complain to him of the behavior of Mr. +Benfield to himself personally; and what were the particulars? he said, +He did so, and related to him the following particulars. About fifteen +days after Lord Pigot's confinement, Mr. Benfield came to Tanjore, and +delivered the Rajah two letters from the then Governor, Mr. +Stratton,—one public, and the other private. He demanded an immediate +account of the presents which had been made to Lord Pigot, payment of +the tunkahs which he (Mr. Benfield) had received from the Nabob upon the +country, and that the Rajah should only write such letters to the Madras +government as Mr. Benfield should approve and give to him. The Rajah +answered, that he did not acknowledge the validity of any demands made +by the Nabob upon the country; that those tunkahs related to accounts +which he (the Rajah) had no concern with; that he never had given Lord +Pigot any presents, but Lord Pigot had given him many; and that as to +his correspondence with the Madras government, he would not trouble Mr. +Benfield, because he would write his letters himself. That the Rajah +told the witness, that by reason of this answer he was much threatened, +in consequence of which he desired Colonel Harper, who then commanded at +Tanjore, to be <a name="Page_148" id="Page_148" title="148" class="pagenum"></a>present at his next interview with Mr. Benfield; when +Mr. Benfield denied many parts of the preceding conversation, and threw +the blame upon his interpreter, Comroo. When Mr. Benfield found (as the +Rajah informed him) that he could not carry these points which had +brought him to Tanjore, he prepared to set off for Madras; that the +Rajah sent him a letter which he had drawn out in answer to one which +Mr. Benfield had brought him; that Mr. Benfield disapproved of the +answer, and returned it by Comroo to the durbar, who did not deliver it +into the Rajah's hands, but threw it upon the ground, and expressed +himself improperly to him.</p> + +<p>Being asked, Whether it was at the king of Tanjore's desire, that such +persons as Mr. Benfield and Comroo had been brought into his presence? +he said, The Rajah told him, that, when Lord Pigot came to Tanjore, to +restore him to his dominions, Comroo, without being sent for, or desired +to come to the palace, had found means to get access to his person: he +made an offer of introducing Mr. Benfield to the Rajah, which he +declined.—Being asked, Whether the military officer commanding there +protected the Rajah from the intrusion of such people? he said, The +Rajah did not tell him that he called upon the military officer to +prevent these intrusions, but that he desired Colonel Harper to be +present as a witness to what might pass between him and Mr. +Benfield.—Being asked, If it is usual for persons of the conditions and +occupations of Mr. Benfield and Comroo to intrude themselves into the +presence of the princes of the country, and to treat them with such +freedom? he said, Certainly it is not: less there than in any other +country.—Being asked, Whether the king of Tan<a name="Page_149" id="Page_149" title="149" class="pagenum"></a>jore has no ministers to +whom application might be made to transact such business as Mr. Benfield +and Comroo had to do in the country? he said, Undoubtedly: his minister +is the person whose province it is to transact that business.—Being +asked, Before the invasion of the British troops into Tanjore, what +would have been the consequence, if Mr. Benfield had intruded himself +into the Rajah's presence, and behaved in that manner? he said, He could +not say what would have been the consequence; but the attempt would have +been madness, and could not have happened.—Being asked, Whether the +Rajah had not particular exceptions to Comroo, and thought he had +betrayed him in very essential points? he said, Yes, he had.—Being +asked, Whether the Rajah has not been apprised that the Company have +made stipulations that their servants should not interfere in the +concerns of his government? he said, He signified it to the Rajah, that +it was the Company's positive orders, and that any of their servants so +interfering would incur their highest displeasure.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3><a name="No_8" id="No_8" />No. 8.<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%">Referred to from p. <a href="#Page_87">87</a>, &c.</span><br /> +<br /> +<i>Commissioners' Amended Clauses for the Fort St. George Dispatch, +relative to the Indeterminate Mights and Pretensions of the Nabob of +Arcot and Rajah of Tanjore.</i></h3> + + +<p>In our letter of the 28th January last we stated the reasonableness of +our expectation that certain <a name="Page_150" id="Page_150" title="150" class="pagenum"></a>contributions towards the expenses of the +war should be made by the Rajah of Tanjore. Since writing that letter, +we have received one from the Rajah, of the 15th of October last, which +contains at length his representations of his inability to make such +further payment. We think it unnecessary here to discuss whether these +representations are or are not exaggerated, because, from the +explanations we have given of our wishes for a new arrangement in +future, both with the Nabob of Arcot and the Rajah of Tanjore, and the +directions we have given you to carry that arrangement into execution, +we think it impolitic to insist upon any demands upon the Rajah for the +expenses of the late war, beyond the sum of four lacs of pagodas +annually: such a demand might tend to interrupt the harmony which should +prevail between the Company and the Rajah, and impede the great objects +of the general system we have already so fully explained to you.</p> + +<p>But although it is not our opinion that any further claim should be made +on the Rajah for his share of the extraordinary expenses of the late +war, it is by no means our intention in any manner to affect the just +claim which the Nabob has on the Rajah for the arrears due to him on +account of peshcush, for the regular payment of which we became guaranty +by the treaty of 1762; but we have already expressed to you our hopes +that the Nabob may be induced to allow these arrears and the growing +payments, when due, to be received by the Company, and carried in +discharge of his debt to us. You are at the same time to use every means +to convince him, that, when this debt shall be discharged, it is our +intention, as we are bound by the above treaty, to exert ourselves <a name="Page_151" id="Page_151" title="151" class="pagenum"></a>to +the utmost of our power to insure the constant and regular payment of it +into his own hands.</p> + +<p>We observe, by the plan sent to us by our Governor of Fort St. George, +on the 30th October, 1781, that an arrangement is there proposed for the +receipt of those arrears from the Rajah in three years.</p> + +<p>We are unable to decide how far this proposal may be consistent with the +present state of the Rajah's resources; but we direct you to use all +proper means to bring these arrears to account as soon as possible, +consistently with a due attention to this consideration.</p> + + +<h3>CLAUSES H.</h3> + +<p>You will observe, that, by the 38th section of the late act of +Parliament, it is enacted, that, for settling upon a permanent +foundation the present indeterminate rights of the Nabob of Arcot and +the Rajah of Tanjore with respect to each other, we should take into our +immediate consideration the said indeterminate rights and pretensions, +and take and pursue such measures as in our judgment and discretion +shall be best calculated to ascertain and settle the same, according to +the principles and the terms and stipulations contained in the treaty of +1762 between the said Nabob and the said Rajah.</p> + +<p>On a retrospect of the proceedings transmitted to us from your +Presidency, on the subject of the disputes which have heretofore arisen +between the Nabob and the Rajah, we find the following points remain +unadjusted, viz.</p> + +<p>1st, Whether the jaghire of Arnee shall be enjoyed by the Nabob, or +delivered up, either to the Rajah, or the descendants of Tremaul Row, +the late jaghiredar.</p> + +<p>2d, Whether the fort and district of Hanamanta<a name="Page_152" id="Page_152" title="152" class="pagenum"></a>goody, which is admitted +by both parties to be within the Marawar, ought to be possessed by the +Nabob, or to be delivered up by him to the Rajah.</p> + +<p>3rd, To whom the government share of the crop of the Tanjore country, of +the year 1775-6, properly belongs.</p> + +<p>Lastly, Whether the Rajah has a right, by usage and custom, or ought, +from the necessity of the case, to be permitted to repair such part of +the Anicut, or dam and banks of the Cavery, as lie within the district +of Trichinopoly, and to take earth and sand in the Trichinopoly +territory for the repairs of the dam and banks within either or both of +those districts.</p> + +<p>In order to obtain a complete knowledge of the facts and circumstances +relative to the several points in dispute, and how far they are +connected with the treaty of 1762, we have with great circumspection +examined into all the materials before us on these subjects, and will +proceed to state to you the result of our inquiries and deliberations.</p> + +<p>The objects of the treaty of 1762 appear to be restricted to the arrears +of tribute to be paid to the Nabob for his past claims, and to the +quantum of the Rajah's future tribute or peshcush; the cancelling of a +certain bond given by the Rajah's father to the father of the Nabob; the +confirmation to the Rajah of the districts of Coveladdy and Elangaud, +and the restoration of Tremaul Row to his jaghire of Arnee, in +condescension to the Rajah's request, upon certain stipulations, viz., +that the fort of Arnee and Doby Gudy should be retained by the Nabob; +that Tremaul Row should not erect any fortress, walled pagoda, or other +stronghold, nor any wall round his dwelling-house exceeding eight feet +high or two feet <a name="Page_153" id="Page_153" title="153" class="pagenum"></a>thick, and should in all things behave himself with +due obedience to the government; and that he should pay yearly, in the +month of July, unto the Nabob or his successors, the sum of ten thousand +rupees: the Rajah thereby becoming the security for Tremaul Row, that he +should in all things demean and behave himself accordingly, and pay +yearly the stipulated sum.</p> + +<p>Upon a review of this treaty, the only point now in dispute, which +appears to us to be so immediately connected with it as to bring it +within the strict line of our duty to ascertain and settle according to +the terms and stipulations of the treaty, is that respecting Arnee. For, +although the other points enumerated may in some respects have a +relation to that treaty, yet, as they are foreign to the purposes +expressed in it, and could not be in the contemplation of the +contracting parties at the time of making it, those disputes cannot in +our comprehension fall within the line of description of rights and +pretensions to be now ascertained and settled by us, according to any of +the terms and stipulations of it.</p> + +<p>In respect to the jaghire of Arnee, we do not find that our records +afford us any satisfactory information by what title the Rajah claims +it, or what degree of relationship or connection has subsisted between +the Rajah and the Killadar of Arnee, save only that by the treaty of +1762 the former became the surety for Tremaul Row's performance of his +engagements specified therein, as the conditions for his restoration to +that jaghire; on the death of Tremaul Row, we perceive that he was +succeeded by his widow, and after her death, by his grandson +Seneewasarow, both of whom were admitted to the jaghire by the Nabob.<a name="Page_154" id="Page_154" title="154" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>From your Minutes of Consultation of the 31st October, 1770, and the +Nabob's letter to the President of the 21st March, 1771, and the two +letters from Rajah Beerbur Atchenur Punt (who we presume was then the +Nabob's manager at Arcot) of the 16th and 18th March, referred to in the +Nabob's letter, and transmitted therewith to the President, we observe, +that, previous to the treaty of 1762, Mr. Pigot concurred in the +expediency of the Nabob's taking possession of this jaghire, on account +of the troublesome and refractory behavior of the Arnee braminees, by +their affording protection to all disturbers, who, by reason of the +little distance between Arnee and Arcot, fled to the former, and were +there protected, and not given up, though demanded;—that, though the +jaghire was restored in 1762, it was done under such conditions and +restrictions as were thought best calculated to preserve the peace and +good order of the place and due obedience to government;—that, +nevertheless, the braminees (quarrelling among themselves) did +afterwards, in express violation of the treaty, enlist and assemble many +thousand sepoys, and other troops; that they erected gaddies and other +small forts, provided themselves with wall-pieces, small guns, and other +warlike stores, and raised troubles and disturbances in the neighborhood +of the city of Arcot and the forts of Arnee and Shaw Gaddy; and that, +finally, they imprisoned the hircarrahs of the Nabob, sent with his +letters and instructions, in pursuance of the advice of your board, to +require certain of the braminees to repair to the Nabob at Chepauk, and, +though peremptorily required to repair thither, paid no regard to those, +or to any other orders from the circar.<a name="Page_155" id="Page_155" title="155" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>By the 13th article contained in the instructions given by the Nabob to +Mr. Dupré, as the basis for negotiating the treaty made with the Rajah +in 1771, the Nabob required that the Arnee district should be delivered +up to the circar, because the braminees had broken the conditions which +they were to have observed. In the answers given by the Rajah to these +propositions, he says, "I am to give up to the circar the jaghire +district of Arnee"; and on the 7th of November, 1771, the Rajah, by +letter to Seneewasarow, who appears by your Consultations and country +correspondence to have been the grandson of Tremaul Row, and to have +been put in possession of the jaghire at your recommendation, (on the +death of his grandmother,) writes, acquainting him that he had given the +Arnee country, then in his (Seneewasarow's) possession, to the Nabob, to +whose aumildars Seneewasarow was to deliver up the possession of the +country. And in your letter to us of the 28th February, 1772, you +certified the district of Arnee to be one of the countries acquired by +this treaty, and to be of the estimated value of two lacs of rupees per +annum.</p> + +<p>In our orders dated the 12th of April, 1775, we declared our +determination to replace the Rajah upon the throne of his ancestors, +upon certain terms and conditions, to be agreed upon for the mutual +benefit of himself and the Company, without infringing the rights of the +Nabob. We declared that our faith stood pledged by the treaty of 1762 to +obtain payment of the Rajah's tribute to the Nabob, and that for the +insuring such payment the fort of Tanjore should be garrisoned by our +troops. We directed that you should pay no regard to the article <a name="Page_156" id="Page_156" title="156" class="pagenum"></a>of the +treaty of 1771 which respected the alienation of part of the Rajah's +dominions; and we declared, that, if the Nabob had not a just title to +those territories before the conclusion of the treaty, we denied that he +obtained any right thereby, except such temporary sovereignty, for +securing the payment of his expenses, as is therein mentioned.</p> + +<p>These instructions appear to have been executed in the month of April, +1776; and by your letter of the 14th May following you certified to us +that the Rajah had been put into the possession of the whole country his +father held in 1762, when the treaty was concluded with the Nabob; but +we do not find that you came to any resolution, either antecedent or +subsequent to this advice, either for questioning or impeaching the +right of the Nabob to the sovereignty of Arnee, or expressive of any +doubt of his title to it. Nevertheless, we find, that, although the +Board passed no such resolution, yet your President, in his letter to +the Nabob of the 30th July and 24th August, called upon his Highness to +give up the possession of Arnee to the Rajah; and the Rajah himself, in +several letters to us, particularly in those of 21st October, 1776, and +the 7th of June, 1777, expressed his expectation of our orders for +delivering up that fort and district to him; and so recently as the 15th +of October, 1783, he reminds us of his former application, and states, +that the country of Arnee being guarantied to him by the Company, it of +course is his right, but that it has not been given up to him, and he +therefore earnestly entreats our orders for putting him into the +possession of it. We also observe by your letter of the 14th of October, +1779, that the Rajah had not then accounted for the Na<a name="Page_157" id="Page_157" title="157" class="pagenum"></a>bob's peshcush +since his restoration, but had assigned as a reason for his withdrawing +it, that the Nabob had retained from him the district of Arnee, with a +certain other district, (Hanamantagoody,) which is made the subject of +another part of our present dispatches.</p> + +<p>We have thus stated to you the result of our inquiry into the grounds of +the dispute relative to Arnee; and as the research has offered no +evidence in support of the Rajah's claim, nor even any lights whereby we +can discover in what degree of relationship, by consanguinity, caste, or +other circumstances, the Rajah now stands, or formerly stood, with the +Killadar of Arnee, or the nature of his connection with or command over +that district, or the authority he exercised or assumed previous to the +treaty of 1771, we should think ourselves highly reprehensible in +complying with the Rajah's request,—and the more so, as it is expressly +stated, in the treaty of 1762, that this fort and district were then in +the possession of the Nabob, as well as the person of the jaghiredar, on +account of his disobedience, and were restored him by the Nabob, in +condescension to the Rajah's request, upon such terms and stipulations +as could not, in our judgment, have been imposed by the one or submitted +to by the other, if the sovereignty of the one or the dependency of the +other had been at that time a matter of doubt.</p> + +<p>Although these materials have not furnished us with evidence in support +of the Rajah's claim, they are far from satisfactory to evince the +justice of or the political necessity for the Nabob's continuing to +withhold the jaghire from the descendants of Tremaul Row; his hereditary +right to that jaghire seems to <a name="Page_158" id="Page_158" title="158" class="pagenum"></a>us to have been fully recognized by the +stipulations of the treaty of 1762, and so little doubted, that, on his +death, his widow was admitted by the Nabob to hold it, on account, as +may be presumed, of the nonage of his grandson and heir, Seneewasarow, +who appears to have been confirmed in the jaghire, on her death, by the +Nabob, as the lineal heir and successor to his grandfather.</p> + +<p>With respect to Seneewasarow, it does not appear, by any of the +Proceedings in our possession, that he was concerned in the misconduct +of the braminees, complained of by the Nabob in the year 1770, which +rendered it necessary for his Highness to take the jaghire into his own +hands, or that he was privy to or could have prevented those +disturbances.</p> + +<p>We therefore direct, that, if the heir of Tremaul Row is not at present +in possession of the jaghire, and has not, by any violation of the +treaty, or act of disobedience, incurred a forfeiture thereof, he be +forthwith restored to the possession of it, according to the terms and +stipulations of the treaty of 1762. But if any powerful motive of regard +to the peace and tranquillity of the Carnatic shall in your judgment +render it expedient to suspend the execution of these orders, in that +case you are with all convenient speed to transmit to us your +proceedings thereupon, with the full state of the facts, and of the +reasons which have actuated your conduct.</p> + +<p>We have before given it as our opinion that the stipulations of the +treaty of 1762 do not apply to the points remaining to be decided. But +the late act of Parliament having, from the nature of our connection +with the two powers in the Carnatic, pointed out the expediency, and +even necessity, of settling the several <a name="Page_159" id="Page_159" title="159" class="pagenum"></a>matters in dispute between them +by a speedy and permanent arrangement, we now proceed to give you our +instructions upon, the several other heads of disputes before +enumerated.</p> + +<p>With respect to the fort and district of Hanamantagoody, we observe, +that, on the restoration of the Rajah in 1776, you informed us in your +letter of the 14th of May, That the Rajah had been put into possession +of the whole of the country his father held in 1762, when the treaty was +concluded with the Nabob; and on the 25th of June you came to the +resolution of putting the Rajah into possession of Hanamantagoody, on +the ground of its appearing, on reference to the Nabob's instructions to +Mr. Dupré in June, 1762, to his reply, and to the Rajah's +representations of 25th March, 1771, that Hanamantagoody was actually in +the hands of the late Rajah at the time of making the treaty of 1762. We +have referred as well to those papers as to all the other proceedings on +this subject, and must confess they fall very short of demonstrating to +us the truth of that fact. And we find, by the Secret Consultations of +Fort William of the 7th of August, 1776, that the same doubt was +entertained by our Governor-General and Council.</p> + +<p>But whether, in point of fact, the late Rajah was or was not in +possession of Hanamantagoody in 1762, it is notorious that the Nabob had +always claimed the dominion of the countries of which this fort and +district are a part.</p> + +<p>We observe that the Nabob is now in the actual possession of this fort +and district; and we are not warranted, by any document we have seen, to +concur with the wishes of the Rajah to dispossess him.<a name="Page_160" id="Page_160" title="160" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>With regard to the government share of the crop of 1775-6, we observe by +the dobeer's memorandum, recited in your Consultations of the 13th of +May, 1776, that it was the established custom of the Tanjore country to +gather in the harvest and complete the collections within the month of +March, but that, for the causes therein particularly stated, the harvest +(and of course the collection of the government share of the crop) was +delayed till the month of March was over. We also observe that the Rajah +was not restored to his kingdom until the 11th of April, 1776; and from +hence we infer, that, if the harvest and collection had been finished at +the usual time, the Nabob (being then sovereign of the country) would +have received the full benefit of that year's crop.</p> + +<p>Although the harvest and collection were delayed beyond the usual time, +yet we find by the Proceedings of your government, and particularly by +Mr. Mackay's Minute of the 29th of May, 1776, and also by the dobeer's +account, that the greatest part of the grain was cut down whilst the +Nabob remained in the government of the country.</p> + +<p>It is difficult, from the contradictory allegations on the subject, to +ascertain what was the precise amount of the collections made after the +Nabob ceased to have the possession of the country. But whatever it was, +it appears from General Stuart's letter of the 2d of April, 1777, that +it had been asserted with good authority that the far greater part of +the government share of the crop was plundered by individuals, and never +came to account in the Rajah's treasury.</p> + +<p>Under all the circumstances of this case, we must be of opinion that the +government share of the crop of 1776 belonged to the Nabob, as the then +reigning <a name="Page_161" id="Page_161" title="161" class="pagenum"></a>sovereign of the kingdom of Tanjore, he being, <i>de facto</i>, in +the full and absolute possession of the government thereof; and +consequently that the assignments made by him of the government share of +the crop were valid.</p> + +<p>Nevertheless, we would by no means be understood by this opinion to +suggest that any further demands ought to be made upon the Rajah, in +respect of such parts of the government share of the crop as were +collected by his people.</p> + +<p>For, on the contrary, after so great a length of time as hath elapsed, +we should think it highly unjust that the Rajah should be now compelled +either to pay the supposed balances, whatever they may be, or be called +upon to render a specific account of the collection made by his people.</p> + +<p>The Rajah has already, in his letter to Governor Stratton of the 21st of +April, 1777, given his assurance, that the produce of the preceding +year, accounted for to him, was little more than one lac of pagodas; and +as you have acquainted us, by your letter of the 14th of October, 1779, +that the Rajah has actually paid into our treasury one lac of pagodas, +by way of deposit, on account of the Nabob's claims to the crop, till +our sentiments should be known, we direct you to surcease any further +demands from the Rajah on that account.</p> + +<p>We learn by the Proceedings, and particularly by the Nabob's letter to +Lord Pigot of the 6th of July, 1776, that the Nabob, previous to the +restoration of the Rajah, actually made assignments or granted tunkaws +of the whole of his share of the crop to his creditors and troops; and +that your government, (entertaining the same opinion as we do upon the +ques<a name="Page_162" id="Page_162" title="162" class="pagenum"></a>tion of right to that share,) by letter to the Rajah of the 20th of +August, 1776, recommended to him "to restore to Mr. Benfield (one of the +principal assignees or tunkaw-holders of the Nabob) the grain of the +last year, which was in possession of his people, and said to be +forcibly taken from them,—and farther, to give Mr. Benfield all +reasonable assistance in recovering such debts as should appear to have +been justly due to him from the inhabitants; and acquainted the Rajah +that it had been judged by a majority of the Council that it was the +Company's intention to let the Nabob have the produce of the crop of +1776, but that you had no intention that the Rajah should be accountable +for more than the government share, whatever that might be; and that you +did not mean to do more than recommend to him to see justice done, +leaving the manner and time to himself." Subsequent representations +appear to have been made to the Rajah by your government on the same +subject, in favor of the Nabob's mortgages.</p> + +<p>In answer to these applications, the Rajah, in his letter to Mr. +Stratton of the 12th January, 1777, acquainted you "that he had given +orders respecting the grain which Mr. Benfield had heaped up in his +country; and with regard to the money due to him by the farmers, that he +had desired Mr. Benfield to bring accounts of it, that he might limit a +time for the payment of it proportionably to their ability, and that the +necessary orders for stopping this money out of the inhabitants' share +of the crop had been sent to the ryots and aumildars; that Mr. +Benfield's gomastah was then present there, and oversaw his affairs; and +that in everything that was just he (the Rajah) willingly obeyed our +Governor and Council."<a name="Page_163" id="Page_163" title="163" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>Our opinion being that the Rajah ought to be answerable for no more than +the amount of what he admits was collected by his people for the +government share of the crop; and the Proceedings before us not +sufficiently explaining whether, in the sum which the Rajah, by his +before-mentioned letter of the 21st April, 1777, admits to have +collected, are included those parts of the government share of the crop +which were taken by his people from Mr. Benfield, or from any other of +the assignees or tunkaw-holders; and uninformed, as we also are, what +compensation the Rajah has or has not made to Mr. Benfield, or any other +of the parties from whom the grain was taken by the Rajah's people; or +whether, by means of the Rajah's refusal so to do, or from any other +circumstance, any of the persons dispossessed of their grain may have +had recourse to the Nabob for satisfaction: we are, for these reasons, +incompetent to form a proper judgment what disposition ought in justice +to be made of the one lac of pagodas deposited by the Rajah. But as our +sentiments and intentions are so fully expressed upon the whole subject, +we presume you, who are upon the spot, can have no doubt or difficulty +in making such an application of the deposit as will be consistent with +those principles of justice whereon our sentiments are founded. But +should any such difficulty suggest itself, you will suspend any +application of the deposit, until you have fully explained the same to +us, and have received our further orders.</p> + +<p>With respect to the repairs of the Anicut and banks of the Cavery we +have upon various occasions fully expressed to you our sentiments, and +in particular in our general letter of the 4th July, 1777, we <a name="Page_164" id="Page_164" title="164" class="pagenum"></a>referred +you to the investigation and correspondence on that subject of the year +1764, and to the report made by Mr. James Bourchier, on his personal +survey of the waters, and to several letters of the year 1765 and 1767; +we also, by our said general letter, acquainted you that it appeared to +us perfectly reasonable that the Rajah should be permitted to repair +those banks, and the Anicut, in the same manner as had been practised in +times past; and we directed you to establish such regulations, by +reference to former usage, for keeping the said banks in repair, as +would be effectual, and remove all cause of complaint in future.</p> + +<p>Notwithstanding such our instructions, the Rajah, in his letter to us of +the 15th October, 1783, complains of the destruction of the Anicut; and +as the cultivation of the Tanjore country appears, by all the surveys +and reports of our engineers employed on that service, to depend +altogether on a supply of water by the Cavery, which can only be secured +by keeping the Anicut and banks in repair, we think it necessary to +repeat to you our orders of the 4th July, 1777, on the subject of those +repairs.</p> + +<p>And further, as it appears by the survey and report of Mr. Pringle, that +those repairs are attended with a much heavier expense, when done with +materials taken from the Tanjore district, than with those of +Trichinopoly, and that the last-mentioned materials are far preferable +to the other, it is our order, that, if any occurrences should make it +necessary or expedient, you apply to the Nabob, in our name, to desire +that his Highness will permit proper spots of ground to be set out, and +bounded by proper marks on the Trichinopoly side, where the Rajah and +his <a name="Page_165" id="Page_165" title="165" class="pagenum"></a>people may at all times take sand and earth sufficient for these +repairs; and that his Highness will grant his lease of such spots of +land for a certain term of years to the Company, at a reasonable annual +rent, to the intent that through you the cultivation of the Tanjore +country may be secured, without infringing or impairing the rights of +the Nabob.</p> + +<p>If any attempts have been or shall be hereafter made to divert the water +from the Cavery into the Coleroon, by contracting the current of the +Upper or Lower Cavery, by planting long grass, as mentioned in Mr. +Pringle's report, or by any other means, we have no doubt his Highness, +on a proper representation to him in our name, will prevent his people +from taking any measures detrimental to the Tanjore country, in the +prosperity of which his Highness, as well as the Company, is materially +interested.</p> + +<p>Should you succeed in reconciling the Nabob to this measure, we think it +but just that the proposed lease shall remain no longer in force than +whilst the Rajah shall be punctual in the payment of the annual peshcush +to the Nabob, as well as the rent to be reserved for the spots of +ground. And in order effectually to remove all future occasions of +jealousy and complaint between the parties,—that the Rajah, on the one +hand, may be satisfied that all necessary works for the cultivation of +his country will be made and kept in repair, and that the Nabob, on the +other hand, may be satisfied that no encroachment on his rights can be +made, nor any works detrimental to the fertility of his country +erected,—we think it proper that it should be recommended to the +parties, as a part of the adjustment of this very important point, that +skilful engineers, appointed by the Company, be employed <a name="Page_166" id="Page_166" title="166" class="pagenum"></a>at the Rajah's +expense to conduct all the necessary works, with the strictest attention +to the respective rights and interests of both parties. This will remove +every probability of injury or dispute. But should either party +unexpectedly conceive themselves to be injured, immediate redress might +be obtained by application to the government of Madras, under whose +appointment the engineer will act, without any discussion between the +parties, which might disturb that harmony which it is so much the wish +of the Company to establish and preserve, as essential to the prosperity +and peace of the Carnatic.</p> + +<p>Having now, in obedience to the directions of the act of Parliament, +upon the fullest consideration of the indeterminate rights and +pretensions of the Nabob and Rajah, pointed out such measures and +arrangements as in our judgment and discretion will be best calculated +to ascertain and settle the same, we hope, that, upon a candid +consideration of the whole system, although each of the parties may feel +disappointed in our decision on particular points, they will be +convinced that we have been guided in our investigation by principles of +strict justice and impartiality, and that the most anxious attention has +been paid to the substantial interests of both parties, and such a +general and comprehensive plan of arrangement proposed as will most +effectually prevent all future dissatisfaction.</p> + +<p> +Approved by the Board.<br /> +<br /> +HENRY DUNDAS,<br /> +WALSINGHAM,<br /> +W.W. GRENVILLE,<br /> +MULGRAVE.<br /> +<br /> +WHITEHALL, October 27, 1784.<br /> +</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> +<p><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167" title="167" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="No_9" id="No_9" />No. 9.<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%">Referred to from pp. <a href="#Page_78">78</a> and <a href="#Page_85">85</a>.</span><br /> +<br /> +<i>Extract of a Letter from the Court of Directors to the President and +Council of Fort St. George, as amended and approved by the Board of +Control.</i></h3> + + +<p>We have taken into our consideration the several advices and papers +received from India, relative to the assignment of the revenues of the +Carnatic, from the conclusion of the Bengal treaty to the date of your +letter in October, 1783, together with the representations of the Nabob +of the Carnatic upon that subject; and although we might contend that +the agreement should subsist till we are fully reimbursed his Highness's +proportion of the expenses of the war, yet, from a principle of +moderation, and personal attachment to our old ally, his Highness the +Nabob of the Carnatic, for whose dignity and happiness we are ever +solicitous, and to cement more strongly, if possible, that mutual +harmony and confidence which our connection makes so essentially +necessary for our reciprocal safety and welfare, <i>and for removing from +his mind every idea of secret design on our part to lessen his authority +over the internal government of the Carnatic</i>, and the collection and +administration of its revenues, we have resolved that the assignment +shall be surrendered; and we do accordingly direct our President, in +whose name the assignment was taken, <i>without delay</i>, to surrender the +same to his Highness. But while we have adopted this resolution, we +repose entire confidence in his Highness, that, actuated by the same +motives of liberality, and feelings of old friendship <a name="Page_168" id="Page_168" title="168" class="pagenum"></a>and alliance, he +will cheerfully and instantly accede to such arrangements as are +necessary to be adopted for our common safety, and for preserving the +respect, rights, and interests we enjoy in the Carnatic. The following +are the heads and principles of such an arrangement as we are decisively +of opinion must be adopted for these purposes, viz.</p> + +<p>That, for making a provision for discharging the Nabob's just debts to +the Company and individuals, (for the payment of which his Highness has +so frequently expressed the greatest solicitude,) <i>the Nabob shall give +soucar security for the punctual payment, by instalments</i>, into the +Company's treasury, of twelve lacs of pagodas per annum, (as voluntarily +proposed by his Highness,) until those debts, with interest, shall be +discharged; and shall also consent that the equitable provision lately +made by the British legislature for the liquidation of those debts, <i>and +such resolutions and determinations as we shall hereafter make</i>, under +the authority of that provision for the liquidation and adjustment of +the said debts, <i>bonâ fide</i> incurred, shall be carried into full force +and effect.</p> + +<p>Should any difficulty arise between his Highness and our government of +Fort St. George, in respect to <i>the responsibility of the soucar +security</i>, or the times and terms of the instalments, it is our pleasure +that you pay obedience to the orders and resolutions of our +Governor-General and Council of Bengal in respect thereto, not doubting +but the Nabob will in such case consent to abide by the determination of +our said supreme government.</p> + +<p>Although, from the great confidence we repose in the honor and integrity +of the Nabob, and from an earnest desire not to subject him to any +embarrass<a name="Page_169" id="Page_169" title="169" class="pagenum"></a>ment on this occasion, we have not proposed any specific +assignment of territory or revenue for securing the payments aforesaid, +we nevertheless think it our duty, as well to the private creditors, +whose interests in this respect have been so solemnly intrusted to us by +the late act of Parliament, as from regard to the debt due to the +Company, to insist on a declaration, that, in the event of the failure +of the security proposed, or in default of payment at the stipulated +periods, we reserve to ourselves full right to demand of the Nabob such +<i>additional security</i>, by assignment on his country, as shall be +effectual for answering the purposes of the agreement.</p> + +<p>After having conciliated the mind of the Nabob to this measure, and +adjusted the particulars, you are to carry the same into execution by a +formal deed between his Highness and the Company, according to the tenor +of these instructions.</p> + +<p>As the administration of the British interests and connections in India +has in some respects assumed a new shape by the late act of Parliament, +and a general peace in India has been happily accomplished, the present +appears to us to be the proper period, and which cannot without great +imprudence be omitted, to settle and arrange, by a just and equitable +treaty, a plan for the future defence and protection of the Carnatic, +both in time of peace and war, on a solid and lasting foundation.</p> + +<p>For the accomplishment of this great and necessary object, we direct +you, in the name of the Company, to use your utmost endeavors to impress +the expediency of, and the good effects to be derived from this measure, +so strongly upon the minds of the Nabob and the Rajah of Tanjore, as to +prevail upon them, <a name="Page_170" id="Page_170" title="170" class="pagenum"></a>jointly or separately, to enter into one or more +treaty or treaties with the Company, grounded on this principle of +equity: That all the contracting parties shall be bound to contribute +jointly to the support of the military force and garrisons, as well in +peace as in war.</p> + +<p>That the military peace establishment shall be forthwith settled and +adjusted by the Company, in pursuance of the authority and directions +given to them by the late act of Parliament.</p> + +<p>As the payment of the troops and garrisons, occasional expenses in the +repairs and improvements of fortifications, and other services +incidental to a military establishment, must of necessity be punctual +and accurate, no latitude of personal assurance or reciprocal confidence +of either of the parties on the other must be accepted or required; but +the Nabob and Rajah must of necessity specify particular districts and +revenues for securing the due and regular payment of their contributions +into the treasury of the Company, with whom the charge of the defence of +the coast, and of course the power of the sword, must be exclusively +intrusted, with power for the Company, in case of failure or default of +such payments at the stipulated times and seasons, to enter upon and +possess such districts, and to let the same to renters, to be confirmed +by the Nabob and the Rajah respectively; but, trusting that in the +execution of this part of the arrangement no undue obstruction will be +given by either of those powers, we direct that this part of the treaty +be coupled with a most positive assurance, on our part, of our +determination to support the dignity and authority of the Nabob and +Rajah in the exclusive administration of the civil government and +<a name="Page_171" id="Page_171" title="171" class="pagenum"></a>revenues of their respective countries;—and further, that, in case of +<i>any</i> hostility committed against the territories of either of the +contracting parties on the coast of Coromandel, the whole revenues of +their respective territories shall be considered as one common stock, to +be appropriated in the common cause of their defence; that the Company, +on their part, shall engage to refrain, <i>during the war</i>, from the +application of any part of their revenues to any commercial purposes +whatsoever, but apply the whole, save only the ordinary charges of their +civil government, to the purposes of the war; that the Nabob and the +Rajah shall in like manner engage, on their parts, to refrain, during +the war, from the application of any part of their revenues, save only +what shall be actually necessary for the support of themselves and the +civil government of their respective countries, to any other purposes +than that of defraying the expenses of such military operations as the +Company may find it necessary to carry on for the common safety of their +interests on the coast of Coromandel.</p> + +<p>And to obviate any difficulties or misunderstanding which might arise +from leaving indeterminate the sum necessary to be appropriated for the +civil establishment of each of the respective powers, that the sum be +now ascertained which is indispensably necessary to be applied to those +purposes, and which is to be held sacred under every emergency, and set +apart previous to the application of the rest of the revenues, as hereby +stipulated, for the purposes of mutual or common defence against any +enemy, for <i>clearing</i> the incumbrance which may have become necessarily +incurred in addition to the expenditure of those revenues <i>which must be +always deemed part <a name="Page_172" id="Page_172" title="172" class="pagenum"></a>of the war establishment</i>. This we think absolutely +necessary; as nothing can tend so much to the preservation of peace, and +to prevent the renewal of hostilities, as the early putting the finances +of the several powers upon a clear footing, and the showing to all other +powers that the Company, the Nabob, and the Rajah are firmly united in +one common cause, and combined in one system of permanent and vigorous +defence, for the preservation of their respective territories and the +general tranquillity.</p> + +<p>That the whole aggregate revenue of the contracting parties shall, +during the war, be under the application of the Company, and shall +continue as long after the war <i>as shall be necessary, to discharge the +burdens contracted by it</i>; but it must be declared that this provision +shall in no respect extend to deprive either the Nabob or the Rajah of +the substantial authority necessary to the collection of the revenues of +their respective countries. But it is meant that they shall faithfully +perform the conditions of this arrangement; and if a division of any +part of the revenues to any other than the stipulated purposes shall +take place, the Company shall be entitled to take upon themselves the +collection of the revenue.</p> + +<p>The Company are to engage, during the time they shall administer the +revenues, to produce to the other contracting parties regular accounts +of the application thereof to the purposes stipulated by the treaty, and +faithfully apply them in support of the war.</p> + +<p>And, lastly, as the defence of the Carnatic is thus to rest with the +Company, the Nabob shall be satisfied of the propriety of avoiding all +unnecessary expense, and will therefore agree not to maintain a greater +number of troops than shall be necessary for the sup<a name="Page_173" id="Page_173" title="173" class="pagenum"></a>port of his dignity +and the splendor of the durbar, which number shall be specified in the +treaty; and if any military aid is requisite for the security and +collection of his revenues, other than the fixed establishment employed +to enforce the ordinary collections and preserve the police of the +country, the Company must be bound to furnish him with such aid: the +Rajah of Tanjore must likewise become bound by similar engagements, and +be entitled to similar aid.</p> + +<p>As, in virtue of the powers vested in Lord Macartney by the agreement of +December, 1781, sundry leases, of various periods, have been granted to +renters, we direct that you apply to the Nabob, in our name, for his +consent that they may be <i>permitted</i> to hold their leases to the end of +the stipulated term; and we have great reliance<a name="FNanchor_70_70" id="FNanchor_70_70"></a><a href="#Footnote_70_70" class="fnanchor" title=" For the ground of this "great reliance," see the papers in +this Appendix, No. 5. as also the Nabob's letters to the Court of +Directors in this Appendix, No. 10.">[70]</a> on the liberality +and spirit of accommodation manifested by the Nabob on so many +occasions, that he will be disposed to acquiesce in a proposition so +<i>just and reasonable</i>. But if, contrary to our expectations, his +Highness should be impressed with any particular aversion to comply with +this proposition, we do not desire you to insist upon it as an essential +part of the arrangement to take place between us; but, in that event, +you must take especial care to give such indemnification to the renters +for any loss they may sustain as you judge to be reasonable.</p> + +<p>It equally concerns the honor of our government, that such natives as +may have been put in any degree of authority over the collections, in +consequence of the deed of assignment, and who have proved faithful <a name="Page_174" id="Page_174" title="174" class="pagenum"></a>to +their trust, shall not suffer inconvenience on account of their +fidelity.</p> + +<p>Having thus given our sentiments at large, as well for the surrender of +the assignment as with regard to those arrangements which we think +necessary to adopt in consequence thereof, we cannot dismiss this +subject without expressing our highest approbation of <i>the ability, +moderation, and command of temper</i> with which our President at Madras +has conducted himself in the management of a very delicate and +embarrassing situation. His conduct, and that of the Select Committee of +Fort St. George, in the execution of the trust delegated to Lord +Macartney by the Nabob Mahomed Ali, has been vigorous and effectual, for +the purpose of realizing as great a revenue, at a crisis of necessity, +as the nature of the case admitted; and the imputation of corruption, +suggested in some of the Proceedings, appears to be totally groundless +and unwarranted.</p> + +<p>While we find so much to applaud, it is with regret we are induced to +advert to anything which may appear worthy of blame: as the step of +issuing the Torana Chits in Lord Macartney's own name can only be +justified upon the ground of absolute necessity;<a name="FNanchor_71_71" id="FNanchor_71_71"></a><a href="#Footnote_71_71" class="fnanchor" title=" For the full proof of this necessity, Lord Macartney's +whole correspondence on the subject may be referred to. Without the act +here condemned, not one of the acts commended in the preceding paragraph +could be performed. By referring to the Nabob's letters in this Appendix +it will be seen what sort of task a governor has on his hands, who is to +use, according to the direction of this letter, "acts of address, +civility, and conciliation," and to pay, upon _all_ occasions, _the +highest attention_, to persons who at the very time are falsely, and in +the grossest terms, accusing him of peculation, corruption, treason, and +every species of malversation in office. The recommendation, under +menaces of such behavior, and under such circumstances, conveys a lesson +the tendency of which cannot be misunderstood.">[71]</a> and as his Lordship +had every reason to believe <a name="Page_175" id="Page_175" title="175" class="pagenum"></a>that the demand, when made, would be +irksome and disagreeable to the feelings of Mahomed Ali, every +precaution ought to have been used and more time allowed for proving +that necessity, by previous acts of address, civility, and conciliation, +applied for the purposes of obtaining his authority to such a measure. +It appears to us that more of this might have been used; and therefore +we cannot consider the omission of it as blameless, consistent with our +wishes of sanctifying no act contrary to the spirit of the agreement, or +derogatory to the authority of the Nabob of the Carnatic, in the +exercise of any of his just rights in the government of the people under +his authority.</p> + +<p>We likewise observe, the Nabob has complained that no official +communication was made to him of the peace, for near a month after the +cessation of arms took place. This, and every other mark of disrespect +to the Nabob, will ever appear highly reprehensible in our eyes; and we +direct that you do, upon all occasions, pay the highest attention to him +and his family.</p> + +<p>Lord Macartney, in his Minute of the 9th of September last, has been +fully under our consideration. We shall ever applaud the prudence and +foresight of our servants which induces them to collect and communicate +to us every opinion, or even ground of suspicion they may entertain, +relative to any of the powers in India with whose conduct our interest +and the safety of our settlements is essentially connected. At the same +time we earnestly recommend that those opinions and speculations be +communicated <a name="Page_176" id="Page_176" title="176" class="pagenum"></a>to us with prudence, discretion, and all possible secrecy, +<i>and the terms in which they are conveyed be expressed in a manner as +little offensive as possible to the powers whom they may concern and +into whose hands they may fall</i>.<a name="FNanchor_72_72" id="FNanchor_72_72"></a><a href="#Footnote_72_72" class="fnanchor" title=" The delicacy here recommended, in the _expressions_ +concerning conduct "with which the safety of our settlements is +essentially connected," is a lesson of the same nature with the former. +Dangerous designs, if truly such, ought to be expressed according to +their nature and qualities. And as for the _secrecy_ recommended +concerning the designs here alluded to, nothing can be more absurd; as +they appear very fully and directly in the papers published by the +authority of the Court of Directors in 1775, and may be easily discerned +from the propositions for the Bengal treaty, published in the Reports of +the Committee of Secrecy, and in the Reports of the Select Committee. +The keeping of such secrets too long has been one cause of the Carnatic +war, and of the ruin of our affairs in India.">[72]</a></p> + +<p>We next proceed to give you our sentiments respecting the private debts +of the Nabob; <i>and we cannot but acknowledge</i> that the origin and +justice, both of the loan of 1767, and the loan of 1777, commonly called +the Cavalry Loan, appear to us clear and indisputable, agreeable to the +true sense and spirit of the late act of Parliament.</p> + +<p>In speaking of the loan of 1767, we are to be understood as speaking of +the debt as constituted by the original bonds of that year, bearing +interest at 10<i>l</i>. per cent; and therefore, if any of the Nabob's +creditors, under a pretence that their debts made part of the +consolidated debt of 1767, although secured by bonds of a subsequent +date, carrying an interest exceeding 10<i>l</i>. per cent, shall claim the +benefit of the following orders, we direct that you pay no regard to +such claims, without further especial instructions for that purpose.</p> + +<p>With respect to the consolidated debt of 1777, it <a name="Page_177" id="Page_177" title="177" class="pagenum"></a>certainly stands upon +a less favorable footing. So early as the 27th March, 1769, it was +ordered by our then President and Council of Fort St. George, that, for +the preventing all persons living under the Company's protection from +having any dealings with any of the country powers or their ministers +without the knowledge or consent of the Board, an advertisement should +be published, by fixing it up at the sea-gate, and sending round a copy +to the Company's servants and inhabitants, and to the different +subordinates, and our garrisons, and giving it out in general orders, +stating therein that the President and Council did consider the +irreversible order of the Court of Directors of the year 1714 (whereby +their people were prohibited from having any dealings with the country +governments in money matters) to be in full force and vigor, and thereby +expressly forbidding all servants of the Company, and other Europeans +under their jurisdiction, to make loans or have any money transactions +with any of the princes or states in India, without special license and +permission of the President and Council for the time being, except only +in the particular cases there mentioned, and declaring that any wilful +deviation therefrom should be deemed a breach of orders, and treated as +such. And on the 4th of March, 1778, it was resolved by our President +and Council of Fort St George, that the consolidated debt of 1777 was +not, on any respect whatever, conducted under the auspices or protection +of that government; and on the circumstance of the consolidation of the +said debt being made known to us, we did, on the 23rd of December, 1778, +write to you in the following terms: "Your account of the Nabob's +private debts is very alarming; but from what<a name="Page_178" id="Page_178" title="178" class="pagenum"></a>ever cause or causes those +debts have been contracted or increased, we hereby repeat our orders, +that the sanction of the Company be on no account given to any kind of +security for the payment or liquidation of any part thereof, (except by +the express authority of the Court of Directors,) on any account or +pretence whatever."</p> + +<p>The loan of 1777, therefore, has no sanction or authority from us; and +in considering the situation and circumstances of this loan, we cannot +omit to observe, that the creditors could not be ignorant how greatly +the affairs of the Nabob were at that time deranged, and that his debt +to the Company was then very considerable,—the payment of which the +parties took the most effectual means to postpone, by procuring an +assignment of such specific revenues for the discharge of their own +debts as alone could have enabled the Nabob to have discharged that of +the Company.</p> + +<p>Under all these circumstances, we should be warranted to refuse our aid +or protection in the recovery of this loan. But when we consider the +inexpediency of keeping the subject of the Nabob's debts longer afloat +than is absolutely necessary,—when we consider how much the final +conclusion of this business will tend to promote tranquillity, credit, +and circulation of property in the Carnatic,—and when we consider that +the debtor concurs with the creditor in establishing the justice of +those debts consolidated in 1777 into gross sums, for which bonds were +given, liable to be transferred to persons different from the original +creditors, and having no share or knowledge of the transactions in which +the debts originated, and of course how little ground there is to expect +any substan<a name="Page_179" id="Page_179" title="179" class="pagenum"></a>tial good to result from an unlimited investigation into +them, we have resolved so far to recognize the justice of those debts as +to extend to them that protection which, upon <i>more</i> forcible grounds, +we have seen cause to allow to the other two classes of debts. But +although we so far adopt the general presumption in their favor as to +admit them to a participation in the manner hereafter directed, we do +not mean to debar you from receiving any complaints against those debts +of 1777, at the instance either of the Nabob himself, or of other +creditors injured by their being so admitted, or by any other persons +having a proper interest, or stating reasonable grounds of objection; +and if any complaints are offered, we order that the grounds of all such +be attentively examined by you, and be transmitted to us, together with +the evidence adduced in support of them, for our final decision; and as +we have before directed that the sum of twelve lacs of pagodas, to be +received annually from the Nabob, should be paid into our treasury, it +is our order that the same be distributed according to the following +arrangement.</p> + +<p>That the debt be made up in the following manner, viz.</p> + +<p>The debt consolidated in 1767 to be made up to the end of the year 1784, +with the current interest at ten per cent.</p> + +<p>The Cavalry Loan to be made up to the same period, with the current +interest at twelve per cent.</p> + +<p>The debt consolidated in 1777 to be made up to the same period, with the +current interest at twelve per cent, to November, 1781, and from thence +with the current interest at six per cent.</p> + +<p>The twelve lacs annually to be received are then to be applied,—<a name="Page_180" id="Page_180" title="180" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>1. To the growing interest on the Cavalry Loan, at twelve per cent.</p> + +<p>2. To the growing interest on the debt of 1777, at six per cent.</p> + +<p>The remainder to be equally divided: one half to be applied to the +extinction of the Company's debt; the other half to be applied to the +payment of growing interest at 10<i>l</i>. per cent, and towards the +discharge of the principal of the debt of 1767.</p> + +<p>This arrangement to continue till the principal of the debt 1767 is +discharged.</p> + +<p>The application of the twelve lacs is, then, to be,—</p> + +<p>1. To the interest of the debt of 1777, as above. The remainder to be +then equally divided,—one half towards the discharge of the current +interest and principal of the Cavalry Loan, and the other half towards +the discharge of the Company's debt.</p> + +<p>When the Cavalry Loan shall be thus discharged, there shall then be paid +towards the discharge of the Company's debt seven lacs.</p> + +<p>To the growing interest and capital of the 1777 loan, five lacs.</p> + +<p>When the Company's debt shall be discharged, the whole is then to be +applied in discharge of the debt 1777.</p> + +<p>If the Nabob shall be prevailed upon to apply the arrears and growing +payments of the Tanjore peshcush in further discharge of his debts, over +and above the twelve lacs of pagodas, we direct that the whole of that +payment, when made, shall be applied towards the reduction of the +Company's debt.</p> + +<p>We have laid down these general rules of distribution, as appearing to +us founded on justice, and the relative circumstances of the different +debts; and <a name="Page_181" id="Page_181" title="181" class="pagenum"></a>therefore we give our authority and protection to them only +on the supposition that they who ask our protection acquiesce in the +condition upon which it is given; and therefore we expressly order, +that, if any creditor of the Nabob, a servant of the Company, or being +under our protection, shall refuse to express his acquiescence in these +arrangements, he shall not only be excluded from receiving any share of +the fund under your distribution, but shall be prohibited from taking +any separate measures to recover his debt from the Nabob: it being one +great inducement to our adopting this arrangement, that the Nabob shall +be relieved from all further disquietude by the importunities of his +individual creditors, and be left at liberty to pursue those measures +for the prosperity of his country which the embarrassments of his +situation have hitherto deprived him of the means of exerting. And we +further direct, that, if any creditor shall be found refractory, or +disposed to disturb the arrangement we have suggested, he shall be +dismissed the service, and sent home to England.</p> + +<p>The directions we have given only apply to the three classes of debts +which have come under our observation. It has been surmised that the +Nabob has of late contracted further debts: if any of these are due to +British subjects, we forbid any countenance or protection whatever to be +given to them, until the debt is fully investigated, the nature of it +reported home, and our special instructions upon it received.</p> + +<p>We cannot conclude this subject without adverting in the strongest terms +to the prohibitions which have from time to time issued under the +authority of different Courts of Directors against any of our ser<a name="Page_182" id="Page_182" title="182" class="pagenum"></a>vants, +or of those under our protection, having any money transactions with any +of the country powers, without the knowledge and previous consent of our +respective governments abroad. We are happy to find that the Nabob, +sensible of the great embarrassments, both to his own and the Company's +affairs, which the enormous amount of their private claims have +occasioned, is willing to engage not to incur any new debts with +individuals, and we think little difficulty will be found in persuading +his Highness into a positive stipulation for that purpose. And though +the legislature has thus humanely interfered in behalf of such +individuals as might otherwise have been reduced to great distress by +the past transactions, we hereby, in the most pointed and positive +terms, repeat our prohibition upon this subject, and direct that no +person, being a servant of the Company, or being under our protection, +shall, on any pretence whatever, be concerned in any loan or other money +transaction with any of the country powers, unless with the knowledge +and express permission of our respective governments. And if any of our +servants, or others, being under our protection, shall be discovered in +any respect counteracting these orders, we strictly enjoin you to take +the first opportunity of sending them home to England, to be punished as +guilty of disobedience of orders, and no protection or assistance of the +Company shall be given for the recovery of any loans connected with such +transactions. Your particular attention to this subject is strictly +enjoined; and any connivance on your parts to a breach of our orders +upon it will incur our highest displeasure. In order to put an end to +those intrigues which <a name="Page_183" id="Page_183" title="183" class="pagenum"></a>have been so successfully carried on at the +Nabob's durbar, we repeat our prohibition in the strongest terms +respecting any intercourse between British subjects and the Nabob and +his family; as we are convinced that such an intercourse has been +carried on greatly to the detriment and expense of the Nabob, and merely +to the advantage of individuals. We therefore direct that all persons +who shall offend against the letter and spirit of this necessary order, +whether in the Company's service or under their protection, be forthwith +sent to England.</p> + +<p> +Approved by the Board.<br /> +HENRY DUNDAS,<br /> +WALSINGHAM,<br /> +W.W. GRENVILLE,<br /> +MULGRAVE.<br /> +WHITEHALL, 15th Oct. 1784.<br /> +</p> + +<hr style='width: 25%;' /> + + +<h3><i>Extract from the Representation of the Court of Directors of the East +India Company.</i></h3> + +<p>MY LORDS AND GENTLEMEN,—</p> + +<p>It is with extreme concern that we express a difference of opinion with +your right honorable board, in this early exercise of your controlling +power; but in so novel an institution, it can scarce be thought +extraordinary, if the exact boundaries of our respective functions and +duties should not at once, on either side, be precisely and familiarly +understood, and therefore confide in your justice and candor for +believing that we have no wish to invade or frustrate the salutary +purposes of your institution, as we on our part are thoroughly satisfied +that you have no wish to encroach on the legal powers of the East In<a name="Page_184" id="Page_184" title="184" class="pagenum"></a>dia +Company. We shall proceed to state our objections to such of the +amendments as appear to us to be either insufficient, inexpedient, or +unwarranted.</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>6th. Concerning the private debts of the Nabob of Arcot, and the + application of the fund of twelve lacs of pagodas per annum.</p></div> + +<p>Under this head you are pleased, in lieu of our paragraphs, to +substantiate at once the justice of all those demands which the act +requires us to investigate, subject only to a right reserved to the +Nabob, or any other party concerned, to question the justice of any debt +falling within the last of the three classes. We submit, that at least +the opportunity of questioning, within the limited time, the justice of +any of the debts, ought to have been fully preserved; and supposing the +first and second classes to stand free from imputation, (as we incline +to believe they do,) no injury can result to individuals from such +discussion: and we further submit to your consideration, how far the +express direction of the act to examine the nature and origin of the +debts has been by the amended paragraphs complied with; and whether at +least the rate of interest, according to which the debts arising from +soucar assignment of the land-revenues to the servants of the Company, +acting in the capacity of native bankers, have been accumulated, ought +not to be inquired into, as well as the reasonableness of the deduction +of twenty-five per cent which the Bengal government directed to be made +from a great part of the debts on certain conditions. But to your +appropriation of the fund our duty requires that we should state our +strongest dissent. Our right to be paid the arrears of those expenses by +which, almost <a name="Page_185" id="Page_185" title="185" class="pagenum"></a>to our own ruin, we have preserved the country and all +the property connected with it from falling a prey to a foreign +conqueror, surely stands paramount to all claims for former debts upon +the revenues of a country so preserved, even if the legislature had not +expressly limited the assistance to be given the private creditors to be +such as should be consistent with our own rights. The Nabob had, long +before passing the act, by treaty with our Bengal government, agreed to +pay us seven lacs of pagodas, as part of the twelve lacs, in liquidation +of those arrears; of which seven lacs the arrangement you have been +pleased to lay down would take away from us more than the half, and give +it to private creditors, of whose demands there are only about a sixth +part which do not stand in a predicament that you declare would not +entitle them to any aid or protection from us in the recovery thereof, +were it not upon grounds of expediency, as will more particularly appear +by the annexed estimate. Until our debt shall be discharged, we can by +no means consent to give up any part of the seven lacs to the private +creditors; and we humbly apprehend that in this declaration we do not +exceed the limits of the authority and rights vested in us.</p> + + +<hr style='width: 25%;' /> + + +<h3>THE RIGHT HONORABLE THE COMMISSIONERS FOR THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA.<br /> +<br /> +<i>The Representation of the Court of Directors of the East India +Company</i>.</h3> + +<p>My Lords and Gentlemen,—</p> + +<p>The Court, having duly attended to your reasonings and decisions on the +subjects of Arnee and Hanaman<a name="Page_186" id="Page_186" title="186" class="pagenum"></a>tagoody, beg leave to observe, with due +deference to your judgment, that the directions we had given in these +paragraphs which did not obtain your approbation still appear to us to +have been consistent with justice, and agreeable to the late act of +Parliament, which pointed out to us, as we apprehended, the treaty of +1762 as our guide.</p> + +<p>Signed by order of the said Court,</p> + +<p>THO. MORTON, <i>Sec</i>.</p> + +<p>EAST INDIA HOUSE, the 3rd November, 1784.</p> + + +<hr style='width: 25%;' /> + + +<h3><i>Extract of a Letter from the Commissioners for the Affairs of India, to +the Court of Directors, dated 3rd November, 1784, in Answer to their +Remonstrance</i>.<br /> +<br /> +SIXTH ARTICLE.</h3> + + +<p>We think it proper, considering the particular nature of the subject, to +state to you the following remarks on that part of your representation +which relates to the plan for the discharging of the Nabob's debts.</p> + +<p>1st. You compute the revenue which the Carnatic may be expected to +produce only at twenty lacs of pagodas. If we concurred with you in this +opinion, we should certainly feel our hopes of advantage to all the +parties from this arrangement considerably diminished. But we trust that +we are not too sanguine on this head, when we place the greatest +reliance on the estimate transmitted to you by your President of Fort +St. George, having there the best means of information upon the fact, +and stating it with a particular view to the subject matter of these +paragraphs. Some allowance, we are sensible, must be made for the +difference of collection in the Nabob's hands, but, <a name="Page_187" id="Page_187" title="187" class="pagenum"></a>we trust, not such +as to reduce the receipt nearly to what you suppose.</p> + +<p>2ndly. In making up the amount of the private debts, you take in +compound interest at the different rates specified in our paragraph. +This it was not our intention to allow; and lest any misconception +should arise on the spot, we have added an express direction that the +debts be made up with simple interest only, from the time of their +respective consolidation. Clause F f.</p> + +<p>3rdly. We have also the strongest grounds to believe that the debts will +be in other respects considerably less than they are now computed by +you; and consequently, the Company's annual proportion of the twelve +lacs will be larger than it appears on your estimate. But even on your +own statement of it, if we add to the 150,000<i>l</i>., or 3,75,000 pagodas, +(which you take as the annual proportion to be received by the Company +for five years to the end of 1789,) the annual amount of the Tanjore +peshcush for the same period, and the arrears on the peshcush, (proposed +by Lord Macartney to be received in three years,) the whole will make a +sum not falling very short of pagodas 35,00,000, the amount of pagodas +7,00,000 per annum for the same period. And if we carry our calculations +farther, it will appear, that, both by the plan proposed by the Nabob +and adopted in your paragraphs, and by that which we transmitted to you, +the debt from the Nabob, if taken at 3,000,000<i>l</i>., will be discharged +nearly at the same period, viz., in the course of the eleventh year. We +cannot, therefore, be of opinion that there is the smallest ground for +objecting to this arrangement, as injurious to the interests of the +Company, even if the measure were to be con<a name="Page_188" id="Page_188" title="188" class="pagenum"></a>sidered on the mere ground +of expediency, and with a view only to the wisdom of reëstablishing +credit and circulation in a commercial settlement, without any +consideration of those motives of attention to the feelings and honor of +the Nabob, of humanity to individuals, and of justice to persons in your +service and living under your protection, which have actuated the +legislature, and which afford not only justifiable, but commendable +grounds for your conduct.</p> + +<p>Impressed with this conviction, we have not made any alteration in the +general outlines of the arrangement which we had before transmitted to +you. But, as the amount of the Nabob's revenue is matter of uncertain +conjecture, and as it does not appear just to us that any deficiency +should fall wholly on any one class of these debts, we have added a +direction to your government of Fort St. George, that, if, +notwithstanding the provisions contained in our former paragraphs, any +deficiency should arise, the payments of what shall be received shall be +made in the same proportion which would have obtained in the division of +the whole twelve lacs, had they been paid.</p> + + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3><a name="No_10" id="No_10" />No. 10.<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%">Referred to from p. <a href="#Page_103">103</a>.</span></h3> + +<div class="blockquote"><p>[The following extracts are subjoined, to show the matter and the style +of representation employed by those who have obtained that ascendency +over the Nabob of Arcot which is described in the letter marked No. 6 of +the present Appendix, and which <a name="Page_189" id="Page_189" title="189" class="pagenum"></a>is so totally destructive of the +authority and credit of the lawful British government at Madras. The +charges made by these persons have been solemnly denied by Lord +Macartney; and to judge from the character of the parties accused and +accusing, they are probably void of all foundation. But as the letters +are in the name and under the signature of a person of great rank and +consequence among the natives,—as they contain matter of the most +serious nature,—as they charge the most enormous crimes, and +corruptions of the grossest kind, on a British governor,—and as they +refer to the Nabob's minister in Great Britain for proof and further +elucidation of the matters complained of,—common decency and common +policy demanded an inquiry into their truth or falsehood. The writing is +obviously the product of some English pen. If, on inquiry, these charges +should be made good, (a thing very unlikely,) the party accused would +become a just object of animadversion. If they should be found (as in +all probability they would be found) false and calumnious, and supported +by <i>forgery</i>, then the censure would fall on the accuser; at the same +time the necessity would be manifest for proper measures towards the +security of government against such infamous accusations. It is as +necessary to protect the honest fame of virtuous governors as it is to +punish the corrupt and tyrannical. But neither the Court of Directors +nor the Board of Control have made any inquiry into the truth or +falsehood of these charges. They have covered over the accusers and +accused with abundance of compliments; they have insinuated some oblique +censures; and they have recommended perfect harmony between the chargers +of <a name="Page_190" id="Page_190" title="190" class="pagenum"></a>corruption and peculation and the persons charged with these +crimes.]</p></div> + + +<h3>13th October, 1782. <i>Extract of a Translation of a Letter from the Nabob +of Arcot to the Chairman of the Court of Directors of the East India +Company</i>.</h3> + + +<p>Fatally for me, and for the public interest, the Company's favor and my +unbounded confidence have been lavished on a man totally unfit for the +exalted station in which he has been placed, and unworthy of the trusts +that have been reposed in him. When I speak of one who has so deeply +stabbed my honor, my wounds bleed afresh, and I must be allowed that +freedom of expression which the galling reflection of my injuries and my +misfortunes naturally draws from me. Shall your servants, unchecked, +unrestrained, and unpunished, gratify their private views and ambition +at the expense of my honor, my peace, and my happiness, and to the ruin +of my country, as well as of all your affairs? No sooner had Lord +Macartney obtained the favorite object of his ambition than he betrayed +the greatest insolence towards me, the most glaring neglect of the +common civilities and attentions paid me by all former governors in the +worst of times, and even by the most inveterate of my enemies. He +insulted my servants, endeavored to defame my character by unjustly +censuring my administration, and extended his boundless usurpation to +the whole government of my dominions, in all the branches of judicature +and police; and, in violation of the express articles of the agreements, +proceeded to send renters into the countries, unapproved of by me, men +of bad character, and unequal to my man<a name="Page_191" id="Page_191" title="191" class="pagenum"></a>agement or responsibility. +Though he is chargeable with the greatest acts of cruelty, even to the +shedding the blood and cutting off the noses and ears of my subjects, by +those exercising his authority in the countries, and that even the +duties of religion and public worship have been interrupted or +prevented, and though he carries on all his business by the arbitrary +exertion of military force, yet does he not collect from the countries +one fourth of the revenue that should be produced. The statement he +pretends to hold forth of expected revenue is totally fallacious, and +can never be realized under the management of his Lordship, in the +appointment of renters totally disqualified, rapacious, and +irresponsible, who are actually embezzling and dissipating the public +revenues that should assist in the support of the war. Totally occupied +by his private views, and governed by his passions, he has neglected or +sacrificed all the essential objects of public good, and by want of +coöperation with Sir Eyre Coote, and refusal to furnish the army with +the necessary supplies, has rendered the glorious and repeated victories +of the gallant general ineffectual to the expulsion of our cruel enemy. +To cover his insufficiency, and veil the discredit attendant on his +failure in every measure, he throws out the most illiberal expressions, +and institutes unjust accusations against me; and in aggravation of all +the distresses imposed upon me, he has abetted the meanest calumniators +to bring forward false charges against me and my son, Amir-ul-Omrah, in +order to create embarrassment, and for the distress of my mind. My +papers and writings sent to you must testify to the whole world the +malevolence of his designs, and the means that have been <a name="Page_192" id="Page_192" title="192" class="pagenum"></a>used to +forward them. He has violently seized and opened all letters addressed +to me and my servants, on my public and private affairs. My vackeel, +that attended him according to ancient custom, has been ignominiously +dismissed from his presence, and not suffered to approach the +Government-House. He has in the meanest manner, and as he thought in +secret, been tampering and intriguing with my family and relations for +the worst of purposes. And if I express the agonies of my mind under +these most pointed injuries and oppressions, and complain of the +violence and injustice of Lord Macartney, I am insulted by his affected +construction that my communications are dictated by the insinuations of +others, at the same time that his conscious apprehensions for his +misconduct have produced the most abject applications to me to smother +my feelings, and entreaties to write in his Lordship's favor to England, +and to submit all my affairs to his direction. When his submissions have +failed to mould me to his will, he has endeavored to effect his purposes +by menaces of his secret influence with those in power in England, which +he pretends to assert shall be effectual to confirm his usurpation, and +to deprive me, and my family, in succession, of my rights of sovereignty +and government forever. To such a length have his passions and violences +carried him, that all my family, my dependants, and even my friends and +visitors, are persecuted with the strongest marks of his displeasure. +Every shadow of authority in my person is taken from me, and respect to +my name discouraged throughout the whole country. When an officer of +high rank in his Majesty's service was some time since introduced to me +by Lord Macartney, his Lordship took occasion to show <a name="Page_193" id="Page_193" title="193" class="pagenum"></a>a personal +derision and contempt of me. Mr. Richard Sulivan, who has attended my +durbar under the commission of the Governor-General and Council of +Bengal, has experienced his resentment; and Mr. Benfield, <i>with whom I +have no business</i>, and who, as he has been accustomed to do for many +years, has continued to pay me his visits of respect, has felt the +weight of his Lordship's displeasure, and has had every unmerited +insinuation thrown out against him, to prejudice him, and deter him from +paying me his compliments as usual.</p> + +<p>Thus, Gentlemen, have you delivered me over to a stranger; to a man +unacquainted with government and business, and too opinionated to learn; +to a man whose ignorance and prejudices operate to the neglect of every +good measure, or the liberal coöperation with any that wish well to the +public interests; to a man who, to pursue his own passions, plans, and +designs, will certainly ruin all mine, as well as the Company's affairs. +His mismanagement and obstinacy have caused the loss of many lacs of my +revenues, dissipated and embezzled, and every public consideration +sacrificed to his vanity and private views. I beg to offer an instance +in proof of my assertions, and to justify the hope I have that you will +cause to be made good to me all the losses I have sustained by the +maladministration and bad practices of your servants, according to all +the account of receipts of former years, and which I made known to Lord +Macartney, amongst other papers of information, in the beginning of his +management in the collections. The district of Ongole produced annually, +upon a medium of many years, 90,000 pagodas; but Lord Macartney, <i>upon +receiving a sum of money from Ramchun<a name="Page_194" id="Page_194" title="194" class="pagenum"></a>dry</i><a name="FNanchor_73_73" id="FNanchor_73_73"></a><a href="#Footnote_73_73" class="fnanchor" title=" See Tellinga letter, at the end of this correspondence.">[73]</a> let it out to him, in +April last, for the inadequate rent of 50,000 pagodas per annum, +diminishing, in this district alone, near half the accustomed revenues. +After this manner hath he exercised his powers over the countries, to +suit his own purposes and designs; and this secret mode has he taken to +reduce the collections.</p> + +<hr style='width: 25%;' /> + + +<h3>1st November, 1782. <i>Copy of a Letter from the Nabob of Arcot to the +Court of Directors, &c.</i> Received 7th April, 1783.</h3> + +<p>The distresses which I have set forth in my former letters are now +increased to such an alarming pitch by the imprudent measures of your +Governor, and by the arbitrary and impolitic conduct pursued with the +merchants and importers of grain, that the very existence of the Fort of +Madras seems at stake, and that of the inhabitants of the settlement +appears to have been totally overlooked: many thousands have died, and +continue hourly to perish of famine, though the capacity of one of your +youngest servants, with diligence and attention, by doing justice, and +giving reasonable encouragement to the merchants, and by drawing the +supplies of grain which the northern countries would have afforded, +might have secured us against all those dreadful calamities. I had with +much difficulty procured and purchased a small quantity of rice, for the +use of myself, my family, and attendants, and with a view of sending off +the greatest part of the latter to the northern countries, with a little +subsistence in their hands. But what must your surprise be, when you +learn that even this rice was <a name="Page_195" id="Page_195" title="195" class="pagenum"></a>seized by Lord Macartney, with a military +force! and thus am I unable to provide for the few people I have about +me, who are driven to such extremity and misery that it gives me pain to +behold them. I have desired permission to get a little rice from the +northern countries for the subsistence of my people, without its being +liable to seizure by your sepoys: this even has been refused me by Lord +Macartney. What must your feelings be, on such wanton cruelty exercised +towards me, when you consider, that, of thousands of villages belonging +to me, a single one would have sufficed for my subsistence!</p> + + +<hr style='width: 25%;' /> + + +<h3>22d March, 1783. <i>Translation of a Letter from the Nabob of Arcot to the +Chairman and Directors of the East India Company</i>. Received from Mr. +James Macpherson, 1st January, 1784.</h3> + + +<p>I am willing to attribute this continued usurpation to the fear of +detection in Lord Macartney: he dreads the awful day when the scene of +his enormities will be laid open, at my restoration to my country, and +when the tongues of my oppressed subjects will be unloosed, and proclaim +aloud the cruel tyrannies they have sustained. These sentiments of his +Lordship's designs are corroborated by his sending, on the 10th instant, +two gentlemen to me and my son, Amir-ul-Omrah; and these gentlemen from +Lord Macartney especially set forth to me, and to my son, that all +dependence on the power of the superior government of Bengal to enforce +the intentions of the Company to restore my country was vain and +groundless,—that the Company confided in his Lordship's judgment and +discretion, and upon his representations, and <a name="Page_196" id="Page_196" title="196" class="pagenum"></a>that if I, and my son, +Amir-ul-Omrah, would enter into friendship with Lord Macartney, and sign +a paper declaring all my charges and complaints against him to be false, +that his Lordship might be induced to write to England that all his +allegations against me and my son were not well founded, and, +notwithstanding his declarations to withhold my country, yet, on these +considerations, it might be still restored to me.</p> + +<p>What must be your feelings for your ancient and faithful friend, on his +receiving such insults to his honor and understanding from your +principal servant, armed with your authority! From these manoeuvres, +amongst thousands I have experienced, the truth must evidently appear to +you, that I have not been loaded with those injuries and oppressions +from motives of public service, but to answer the private views and +interests of his Lordship and his secret agents: <i>some papers to this +point are inclosed</i>; others, almost without number, must be submitted to +your justice, when time and circumstances shall enable me fully to +investigate those transactions. This opportunity will not permit the +full representation of my load of injuries and distresses: I beg leave +to refer you to my minister, Mr. Macpherson, for the papers, according +to the inclosed list, which accompanied my last dispatches by the +Rodney, which I fear have failed; and my correspondence with Lord +Macartney subsequent to that period, such as I have been able to prepare +for this opportunity, are inclosed.</p> + +<p>Notwithstanding all the violent acts and declarations of Lord Macartney, +yet a consciousness of his own misconduct was the sole incentive to the +menaces and overtures he has held out in various shapes. He has been +insultingly lavish in his expressions of <a name="Page_197" id="Page_197" title="197" class="pagenum"></a>high respect for my person; +has had the insolence to say that all his measures flowed from his +affectionate regard alone; has presumed to say that all his enmity and +oppression were levelled at my son, Amir-ul-Omrah, to whom he before +acknowledged every aid and assistance; and his Lordship being without +any just cause or foundation for complaint against us, or a veil to +cover his own violences, he has now had recourse to the meanness and has +dared to intimate of my son, in order to intimidate me and to strengthen +his own wicked purposes, to be in league with our enemies the French. +You must doubtless be astonished, no less at the assurance than at the +absurdity of such a wicked suggestion.</p> + +<hr style='width: 25%;' /> + +<h3>IN THE NABOB'S OWN HAND.</h3> + +<p>P.S. In my own handwriting I acquainted Mr. Hastings, as I now do my +ancient friends the Company, with the insult offered to my honor and +understanding, in the extraordinary propositions sent to me by Lord +Macartney, through two gentlemen, on the 10th instant, so artfully +veiled with menaces, hopes, and promises. But how can Lord Macartney add +to his enormities, after his wicked and calumniating insinuations, so +evidently directed against me and my family, through my faithful, my +dutiful, and beloved son, Amir-ul-Omrah, who, you well know, has been +ever born and bred amongst the English, whom I have studiously brought +up in the warmest sentiments of affection and attachment to +them,—sentiments that in his maturity have been his highest ambition to +improve, insomuch that he knows no happiness but in the faithful support +of our alliance and connection with the English nation?<a name="Page_198" id="Page_198" title="198" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<h3>12th August, and Postscript of the 16th August, 1783. <i>Translation + of a Letter to the Chairman and Directors of the East India + Company.</i> Received from Mr. James Macpherson, 14th January, 1784.</h3> + +<p>Your astonishment and indignation will be equally raised with mine, when +you hear that your President <i>has dared</i>, contrary to your intention, to +continue to usurp the privileges and hereditary powers of the Nabob of +the Carnatic, your old and unshaken friend, and the declared ally of the +king of Great Britain.</p> + +<p>I will not take up your time by enumerating the particular acts of Lord +Macartney's violence, cruelty, and injustice: <i>they, indeed, occur too +frequently, and fall upon me and my devoted subjects and country too +thick, to be regularly related</i>. I refer you to my minister, Mr. James +Macpherson, <i>for a more circumstantial account of the oppressions and +enormities by which he has brought both mine</i> and the Company's affairs +to the brink of destruction. I trust that such flagrant violations of +all justice, honor, and the faith of treaties will receive the severest +marks of your displeasure, and that Lord Macartney's conduct, in making +use of your name and authority as a sanction for the continuance of his +usurpation, will be disclaimed with the utmost indignation, and followed +with the severest punishment. I conceive that his Lordship's arbitrary +retention of my country and government can only originate in his +<i>insatiable cravings</i>, in his implacable malevolence against me, and +through fear of detection, which must follow the surrender of the +Carnatic into my hands, of those nefarious proceedings <a name="Page_199" id="Page_199" title="199" class="pagenum"></a>which are now +suppressed by the arm of violence and power.</p> + +<p>I did not fail to represent to the supreme government of Bengal the +deplorable situation to which I was reduced, and the unmerited +persecutions I have unremittingly sustained from Lord Macartney; and I +earnestly implored them to stretch forth a saving arm, and interpose +that controlling power which was vested in them, to check <i>rapacity and +presumption</i>, and preserve the honor and faith of the Company from +violation. The Governor-General and Council not only felt the cruelty +and injustice I had suffered, but were greatly alarmed for the fatal +consequences that might result from the distrust of the country powers +in the professions of the English, when they saw the Nabob of the +Carnatic, the friend of the Company, and the ally of Great Britain, thus +stripped of his rights, his dominions, and his dignity, by the most +fraudulent means, and under the mask of friendship. The Bengal +government had already heard both the Mahrattas and the Nizam urge, as +an objection to an alliance with the English, the faithless behavior of +Lord Macartney to a prince whose life had been devoted and whose +treasures had been exhausted in their service and support; and they did +not hesitate to give positive orders to Lord Macartney for the +restitution of my government and authority, on such terms as were not +only strictly honorable, but equally advantageous to my friends the +Company: for they justly thought that my honor and dignity and +<i>sovereign rights</i> were the first objects of my wishes and ambition. But +how can I paint my astonishment at Lord Macartney's presumption in +continuing his usurpation after their positive and reiterated mandates, +and, <a name="Page_200" id="Page_200" title="200" class="pagenum"></a>as if nettled by their interference, which he disdained, in +redoubling the fury of his violence, and sacrificing the public and +myself to his malice and ungovernable passions?</p> + +<p>I am, Gentlemen, at a loss to conceive where his usurpation will stop +and have an end. Has he not solemnly declared that the assignment was +only made for the support of war? and if neither your instructions nor +the orders of his superiors at Bengal were to be considered as +effectual, has not the treaty of peace virtually determined the period +of his tyrannical administration? But so far from surrendering the +Carnatic into my hands, he has, since that event, affixed advertisements +to the walls and gates of the Black Town for letting to the best bidder +the various districts for the term of three years,—and has continued +the Committee of Revenue, which you positively ordered to be abolished, +to whom he has allowed enormous salaries, from 6000 to 4000 pagodas per +annum, which each member has received from the time of his appointment, +though his Lordship well knows that most of them are by your orders +disqualified by being my principal creditors.</p> + +<p>If those acts of violence and outrage had been productive of public +advantage, I conceive his Lordship might have held them forward in +extenuation of his conduct; but whilst he cloaks his justification under +the veil of your records, it is impossible to refute his assertions or +to expose to you their fallacy; and when he is no longer able to support +his conduct by argument, he refers to those records, where, I +understand, he has exercised all his sophistry and malicious +insinuations to render me and my family obnoxious in the eyes of the +Company and the Brit<a name="Page_201" id="Page_201" title="201" class="pagenum"></a>ish nation. And when the glorious victories of Sir +Eyre Coote have been rendered abortive by a constant deficiency of +supplies,—and when, since the departure of that excellent general to +Bengal, whose loss I must ever regret, a dreadful famine, at the close +of last year, occasioned by his Lordship's neglect to lay up a +sufficient stock of grain at a proper season, and from his prohibitory +orders to private merchants,—and when no exertion has been made, nor +advantage gained over the enemy,—when Hyder's death and Tippoo's return +to his own dominions operated in no degree for the benefit of our +affairs,—in short, when all has been a continued series of +disappointment and disgrace under Lord Macartney's management, (and in +him alone has the management been vested,)—I want words to convey those +ideas of his insufficiency, ignorance, and obstinacy which I am +convinced you would entertain, had you been spectators of his ruinous +and destructive conduct.</p> + +<p>But against me, and my son, Amir-ul-Omrah, has his Lordship's vengeance +chiefly been exerted: even the Company's own subordinate zemindars have +found better treatment, probably because they were more rich; those of +Nizanagoram have been permitted, contrary to your pointed orders, to +hold their rich zemindaries at the old disproportionate rate of little +more than a sixth part of the real revenue; and my zemindar of Tanjore, +though he should have regarded himself equally concerned with us in the +event of the war, and from whose fertile country many valuable harvests +have been gathered in, which have sold at a vast price, has, I +understand, only contributed, last year, towards the public exigencies, +the very incon<a name="Page_202" id="Page_202" title="202" class="pagenum"></a>siderable sum of one lac of pagodas, and a few thousand +pagodas' worth of grain.</p> + +<p>I am much concerned to acquaint you that ever since the peace a dreadful +famine has swept away many thousands of the followers and sepoys' +families of the army, from Lord Macartney's neglect to send down grain +to the camp, though the roads are crowded with vessels: but his Lordship +has been too intent upon his own disgraceful schemes to attend to the +wants of the army. The negotiation with Tippoo, which he has set on foot +through the mediation of Monsieur Bussy, has employed all his thoughts, +and to the attainment of that object he will sacrifice the dearest +interests of the Company to gratify his malevolence against me, and for +his own private advantages. The endeavor to treat with Tippoo, through +the means of the French, must strike you, Gentlemen, as highly improper +and impolitic; but it must raise your utmost indignation to hear, that, +by intercepted letters from Bussy to Tippoo, as well as from their +respective vakeels, and from various accounts from Cuddalore, we have +every reason to conclude that his Lordship's secretary, Mr. Staunton, +when at Cuddalore, as his agent to settle the cessation of arms with the +French, was informed of all their operations and projects, and +<i>consequently that Lord Macartney has secretly connived at Monsieur +Bussy's recommendation to Tippoo to return into the Carnatic, as the +means of procuring the most advantageous terms, and furnishing Lord +Macartney with the plea of necessity for concluding a peace after his +own manner</i>: and what further confirms the truth of this fact is, that +repeated reports, as well as the alarms of the inhabitants to the +westward, leave us no reason to doubt that Tippoo is approaching +to<a name="Page_203" id="Page_203" title="203" class="pagenum"></a>wards us. His Lordship has issued public orders that the garrison +store of rice, for which we are indebted to the exertions of the Bengal +government, should be immediately disposed of, and has strictly forbid +all private grain to be sold; by which act he effectually prohibits all +private importation of grain, and may eventually cause as horrid a +famine as that which we experienced at the close of last year from the +same shortsighted policy and destructive prohibitions of Lord Macartney.</p> + +<p>But as he has the fabrication of the records in his own hands, he trusts +to those partial representations of his character and conduct, because +the signatures of those members of government whom he seldom consults +are affixed, as a public sanction; but you may form a just idea of their +correctness and propriety, when you are informed that his Lordship, +<i>upon my noticing the heavy disbursements made for secret service money, +ordered the sums to be struck off, and the accounts to be erased from +the cash-book of the Company</i>; and I think I cannot give you a better +proof of his management of my country and revenues than by calling your +attention to his conduct in the Ongole province, and by referring you to +his Lordship's administration of your own jaghire, from whence he has +brought to the public account the sum of twelve hundred pagodas for the +last year's revenue, yet blazons forth his vast merits and exertions, +and expects to receive the thanks of his Committee and Council.</p> + +<p>I will beg leave to refer you to my minister, James Macpherson, Esq., +for a more particular account of my sufferings and miseries, to whom I +have transmitted copies of all papers that passed with his Lordship.<a name="Page_204" id="Page_204" title="204" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>I cannot conclude without calling your attention to <i>the situation of my +different creditors</i>, whose claims are the claims of justice, and whose +demands I am bound by honor and every moral obligation to discharge; it +is not, therefore, without great concern I have heard insinuations +tending to question the legality of their right to the payment of those +just debts: they proceeded from advances made by them openly and +honorably for the support of my own and the public affairs. But I hope +the tongue of calumny will never drown the voice of truth and justice; +and while that is heard, the wisdom of the English nation cannot fail to +accede to an effectual remedy for their distresses, by any arrangement +in which their claims may be duly considered and equitably provided for: +and for this purpose, my minister, <i>Mr. Macpherson, will readily +subscribe, in my name, to any agreement you may think proper to adopt, +founded on the same principles</i> with either of the engagements I entered +into with the supreme government of Bengal for our mutual interest and +advantage.</p> + +<p>I always pray for your happiness and prosperity.</p> + +<hr style='width: 25%;' /> + +<h3>6th September, and Postscript of 7th September, 1783. <i>Translation + of a Letter from the Nabob of Arcot to the Chairman and Directors + of the East India Company.</i> Received from Mr. James Macpherson, + 14th January, 1784.</h3> + +<p>I refer you, Gentlemen, to my inclosed duplicate, as well as to my +minister, Mr. Macpherson, for the particulars of my sufferings. There is +no word or action of mine that is not perverted; and though it was my +intention to have sent my son, Amir-ul-Om<a name="Page_205" id="Page_205" title="205" class="pagenum"></a>rah, who is well versed in my +affairs, to Bengal, to impress those gentlemen with a full sense of my +situation, yet I find myself obliged to lay it aside, from the +insinuations of the calumniating tongue of Lord Macartney, that takes +every license to traduce every action of my life and that of my son. I +am informed that Lord Macartney, at this late moment, intends to write a +letter: I am ignorant of the subject, but fully perceive, that, by +delaying to send it till the very eve of the dispatch, he means to +deprive me of all possibility of communicating my reply, and forwarding +it for the information of my friends in England. Conscious of the weak +ground on which he stands, he is obliged to have recourse to these +artifices to mislead the judgment, and support for a time his +unjustifiable measures by deceit and imposition. I wish only to meet and +combat his charges and allegations fairly and openly, and I have +repeatedly and urgently demanded to be furnished with copies of those +parts of his <i>fabricated</i> records relative to myself; but as he well +knows I should refute his sophistry, I cannot be surprised at his +refusal, though I lament that it prevents you, Gentlemen, from a clear +investigation of his conduct towards me.</p> + +<p>Inclosed you have a translation of an arzee from the Killidar of +Vellore. <i>I have thousands of the same kind</i>; but this, just now +received, will serve to give you some idea of the miseries brought upon +this my devoted country, and the wretched inhabitants that remain in it, +by the oppressive hand of Lord Macartney's management: nor will the +<i>embezzlements of collections</i> thus obtained, when brought before you in +<i>proof</i>, appear less extraordinary,—which <i>shall certainly be done in +due time</i>.<a name="Page_206" id="Page_206" title="206" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p><i>Translation of an Arzee, in the Persian Language, from + Uzzim-ul-Doen Cawn, the Killidar of Vellore, to the Nabob</i>, dated + 1st September, 1783. Inclosed in the Nabob's Letter to the Court of + Directors, September, 1783.</p></div> + +<p>I have repeatedly represented to your Highness the violences and +oppressions exercised by the present aumildar [collector of revenue], of +Lord Macartney's appointment, over the few remaining inhabitants of the +districts of Vellore, Amboor, Saulguda, &c.</p> + +<p>The outrages and violences now committed are of that astonishing nature +as were never known or heard of during the administration of the Circar. +Hyder Naik, the cruellest of tyrants, used every kind of oppression in +the Circar countries; but even his measures were not like those now +pursued. Such of the inhabitants as had escaped the sword and pillage of +Hyder Naik, by taking refuge in the woods, and within the walls of +Vellore, &c., on the arrival of Lord Macartney's aumildar to Vellore, +and in consequence of his cowle of protection and support, most +cheerfully returned to the villages, set about the cultivation of the +lands, and with great pains rebuilt their cottages.—But now the +aumildar has imprisoned the wives and children of the inhabitants, +seized the few jewels that were on the bodies of the women, and then, +before the faces of their husbands, flogged them, in order to make them +produce other jewels and effects, which he said they had buried +somewhere under ground, and to make the inhabitants bring him money, +notwithstanding there was yet no cultivation in the country. Terrified +with the flagel<a name="Page_207" id="Page_207" title="207" class="pagenum"></a>lations, some of them produced their jewels and +wearing-apparel of their women, to the amount of ten or fifteen pagodas, +which they had hidden; others, who declared they had none, the aumildar +flogged their women severely, tied cords around their breasts, and tore +the sucking children from their teats, and exposed them to the scorching +heat of the sun. Those children died, as did the wife of Ramsoamy, an +inhabitant of Bringpoor. Even this could not stir up compassion in the +breast of the aumildar. Some of the children that were somewhat large he +exposed to sale. In short, the violences of the aumildar are so +astonishing, that the people, on seeing the present situation, remember +the loss of Hyder with regret. With whomsoever the aumildar finds a +single measure of natchinee or rice, he takes it away from him, and +appropriates it to the expenses of the sibindy that he keeps up. No +revenues are collected from the countries, but from the effects of the +poor, wretched inhabitants. Those ryots [yeomen] who intended to return +to their habitations, hearing of those violences, have fled for refuge, +with their wives and children, into Hyder's country. Every day is +ushered in and closed with these violences and disturbances. I have no +power to do anything; and who will hear what I have to say? My business +is to inform your Highness, who are my master. The people bring their +complaints to me, and I tell them I will write to your Highness.<a name="FNanchor_74_74" id="FNanchor_74_74"></a><a href="#Footnote_74_74" class="fnanchor" title=" The above-recited practices, or practices similar to them, +have prevailed in almost every part of the miserable countries on the +coast of Coromandel for near twenty years past. That they prevailed as +strongly and generally as they could prevail, under the administration +of the Nabob, there can be no question, notwithstanding the assertion in +the beginning of the above petition; nor will it ever be otherwise, +whilst affairs are conducted upon the principles which influence the +present system. Whether the particulars here asserted are true or false +neither the Court of Directors nor their ministry have thought proper to +inquire. If they are true, in order to bring them to affect Lord +Macartney, it ought to be proved that the complaint was made _to him, +and that he had refused redress_. Instead of this fair course, the +complaint is carried to the Court of Directors.—The above is one of the +documents transmitted by the Nabob, in proof of his charge of corruption +against Lord Macartney. If genuine, it is conclusive, at least against +Lord Macartney's principal agent and manager. If it be a forgery, (as in +all likelihood it is,) it is conclusive against the Nabob and his evil +counsellors, and folly demonstrates, if anything further were necessary +to demonstrate, the necessity of the clause in Mr. Fox's bill +prohibiting the residence of the native princes in the Company's +principal settlements,—which clause was, for obvious reasons, not +admitted into Mr. Pitt's. It shows, too, the absolute necessity of a +severe and exemplary punishment on certain of his English evil +counsellors and creditors, by whom such practices are carried on.">[74]</a><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208" title="208" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p><i>Translation of a Tellinga Letter from Veira Permaul, Head Dubash + to Lord Macartney, in his own Handwriting, to Rajah Ramchunda, the + Renter of Ongole.</i> Dated 25th of the Hindoo month Mausay, in the + year Plavanamal, corresponding to 5th March, 1782.</p></div> + +<p>I present my respects to you, and am very well here, wishing to hear +frequently of your welfare.</p> + +<p>Your peasher Vancatroyloo has brought the Visseel Bakees, and delivered +them to me, as <i>also what you sent him for me to deliver to my master, +which I have done. My master at first refused to take it, because he is +unacquainted with your disposition</i>, or what kind of a person you are. +But after I made encomiums on your goodness and greatness of mind, and +took my oath to the same, and that <i>it would not be<a name="Page_209" id="Page_209" title="209" class="pagenum"></a>come public</i>, but be +held as precious as our lives, <i>my master accepted it</i>. You may remain +satisfied that I will get the Ongole business settled in your name; I +will cause the jamaubundee to be settled agreeable to your desire. It +was formerly the Nabob's intention to give this business to you, as the +Governor knows full well, but did not at that time agree to it, which +you must be well acquainted with.</p> + +<p>Your peasher Vancatroyloo is a very careful, good man; he is well +experienced in business; <i>he has bound me by an oath to keep all this +business secret, and that his own, yours, and my lives are responsible +for it</i>. I write this letter to you with the greatest reluctance, and I +signified the same to your peasher, and declared that I would not write +to you by any means. To this the peasher urged, that, <i>if I did not +write to his master, how could he know to whom he (the peasher) +delivered the money</i>, and what must his master think of it? Therefore I +write you this letter, and send it by my servant Ramanah, accompanied by +the peasher's servant, and it will come safe to your hands. After +perusal, you will send it back to me immediately: until I receive it, I +don't like to eat my victuals or take any sleep. Your peasher took his +oath, and urged me to write this for your satisfaction, and has engaged +to me that I shall have this letter returned to me in the space of +twelve days.</p> + +<p>The present Governor is not like the former Governors: he is a very +great man in Europe; and all the great men of Europe are much obliged, +to him for his condescension in accepting the government of this place. +It is his custom, when he makes friendship with any one, to continue it +always; and if <i>he is at enmity with any one, he never will desist till +he has worked <a name="Page_210" id="Page_210" title="210" class="pagenum"></a>his destruction. He is now exceedingly displeased with +the Nabob, and you will understand by-and-by that the Nabob's business +cannot be carried on</i>; he (the Nabob) will have no power to do anything +in his own affairs: <i>you have, therefore, no room to fear him</i>; you may +remain with a contented mind. I desired the Governor to write you a +letter for your satisfaction: the Governor said he would do so, when the +business was settled. This letter you must peruse as soon as possible, +and send it back with all speed by the bearer, Ramadoo, accompanied by +three or four of your people, to the end that no accident may happen on +the road. These people must be ordered to march in the night only, and +to arrive here with the greatest dispatch. You sent ten mangoes for my +master and two for me, all of which I have delivered to my master, +thinking that ten was not sufficient to present him with. I write this +for your information, and salute you with ten thousand respects.</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>I, Muttu Kistnah, of Madras Patnam, dubash, declare that I + perfectly understand the Gentoo language, and do most solemnly + affirm that the foregoing is a true translation of the annexed + paper writing from the Gentoo language.</p> + +<p> (Signed)</p> + +<p> Muttu Kistnah.</p></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_68_68" id="Footnote_68_68" /><a href="#FNanchor_68_68"><span class="label">[68]</span></a> In this statement, the Ongole country, though it is +included under the head of gross revenue, has been let for a certain +sum, exclusive of charges. If the expenses specified in the Nabob's +vassool accounts for this district are added, the present gross revenue +even would appear to exceed the Nabob's; and as the country is only let +for one year, there may hereafter be an increase of its revenue.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_69_69" id="Footnote_69_69" /><a href="#FNanchor_69_69"><span class="label">[69]</span></a> The Trichinopoly countries let for the above sum, +exclusive of the expenses of sibbendy and saderwared, amounting, by the +Nabob's accounts, to rupees 1,30,00 per annum, which are to be defrayed +by the renter. And the jaghires of Amir-ul-Omrah and the Begum are not +included in the present lease.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_70_70" id="Footnote_70_70" /><a href="#FNanchor_70_70"><span class="label">[70]</span></a> For the ground of this "great reliance," see the papers in +this Appendix, <a href="#No_5">No. 5</a>. as also the Nabob's letters to the Court of +Directors in this Appendix, <a href="#No_10">No. 10</a>.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_71_71" id="Footnote_71_71" /><a href="#FNanchor_71_71"><span class="label">[71]</span></a> For the full proof of this necessity, Lord Macartney's +whole correspondence on the subject may be referred to. Without the act +here condemned, not one of the acts commended in the preceding paragraph +could be performed. By referring to the Nabob's letters in this Appendix +it will be seen what sort of task a governor has on his hands, who is to +use, according to the direction of this letter, "acts of address, +civility, and conciliation," and to pay, upon <i>all</i> occasions, <i>the +highest attention</i>, to persons who at the very time are falsely, and in +the grossest terms, accusing him of peculation, corruption, treason, and +every species of malversation in office. The recommendation, under +menaces of such behavior, and under such circumstances, conveys a lesson +the tendency of which cannot be misunderstood.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_72_72" id="Footnote_72_72" /><a href="#FNanchor_72_72"><span class="label">[72]</span></a> The delicacy here recommended, in the <i>expressions</i> +concerning conduct "with which the safety of our settlements is +essentially connected," is a lesson of the same nature with the former. +Dangerous designs, if truly such, ought to be expressed according to +their nature and qualities. And as for the <i>secrecy</i> recommended +concerning the designs here alluded to, nothing can be more absurd; as +they appear very fully and directly in the papers published by the +authority of the Court of Directors in 1775, and may be easily discerned +from the propositions for the Bengal treaty, published in the Reports of +the Committee of Secrecy, and in the Reports of the Select Committee. +The keeping of such secrets too long has been one cause of the Carnatic +war, and of the ruin of our affairs in India.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_73_73" id="Footnote_73_73" /><a href="#FNanchor_73_73"><span class="label">[73]</span></a> See Tellinga letter, at the end of this correspondence.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_74_74" id="Footnote_74_74" /><a href="#FNanchor_74_74"><span class="label">[74]</span></a> The above-recited practices, or practices similar to them, +have prevailed in almost every part of the miserable countries on the +coast of Coromandel for near twenty years past. That they prevailed as +strongly and generally as they could prevail, under the administration +of the Nabob, there can be no question, notwithstanding the assertion in +the beginning of the above petition; nor will it ever be otherwise, +whilst affairs are conducted upon the principles which influence the +present system. Whether the particulars here asserted are true or false +neither the Court of Directors nor their ministry have thought proper to +inquire. If they are true, in order to bring them to affect Lord +Macartney, it ought to be proved that the complaint was made <i>to him, +and that he had refused redress</i>. Instead of this fair course, the +complaint is carried to the Court of Directors.—The above is one of the +documents transmitted by the Nabob, in proof of his charge of corruption +against Lord Macartney. If genuine, it is conclusive, at least against +Lord Macartney's principal agent and manager. If it be a forgery, (as in +all likelihood it is,) it is conclusive against the Nabob and his evil +counsellors, and folly demonstrates, if anything further were necessary +to demonstrate, the necessity of the clause in Mr. Fox's bill +prohibiting the residence of the native princes in the Company's +principal settlements,—which clause was, for obvious reasons, not +admitted into Mr. Pitt's. It shows, too, the absolute necessity of a +severe and exemplary punishment on certain of his English evil +counsellors and creditors, by whom such practices are carried on.</p></div> +</div> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211" title="211" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<h2><a name="SUBSTANCE_OF_THE_SPEECH" id="SUBSTANCE_OF_THE_SPEECH" />SUBSTANCE OF THE SPEECH<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 75%">IN THE</span><br /> +<br /> +DEBATE ON THE ARMY ESTIMATES<br /> +<br /> +IN THE HOUSE OF COMMONS,<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%">ON TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 1790</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 75%">COMPREHENDING</span><br /> +<br /> +A DISCUSSION OF THE PRESENT SITUATION OF AFFAIRS IN FRANCE.</h2> +<p><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212" title="212" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<p><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213" title="213" class="pagenum"></a></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>Mr. Burke's speech on the report of the army estimates has not been +correctly stated in some of the public papers. It is of consequence to +him not to be misunderstood. The matter which incidentally came into +discussion is of the most serious importance. It is thought that the +heads and substance of the speech will answer the purpose sufficiently. +If, in making the abstract, through defect of memory in the person who +now gives it, any difference at all should be perceived from the speech +as it was spoken, it will not, the editor imagines, be found in anything +which may amount to a retraction of the opinions he then maintained, or +to any softening in the expressions in which they were conveyed.</p> + +<p>Mr. Burke spoke a considerable time in answer to various arguments, +which had been insisted upon by Mr. Grenville and Mr. Pitt, for keeping +an increased peace establishment, and against an improper jealousy of +the ministers, in whom a full confidence, subject to responsibility, +ought to be placed, on account of their knowledge of the real situation +of affairs, the exact state of which it frequently happened that they +could not disclose without violating the constitutional and political +secrecy necessary to the well-being of their country.<a name="Page_214" id="Page_214" title="214" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>Mr. Burke said in substance, That confidence might become a vice, and +jealousy a virtue, according to circumstances. That confidence, of all +public virtues, was the most dangerous, and jealousy in an House of +Commons, of all public vices, the most tolerable,—- especially where +the number and the charge of standing armies in time of peace was the +question.</p> + +<p>That in the annual Mutiny Bill the annual army was declared to be for +the purpose of preserving the balance of power in Europe. The propriety +of its being larger or smaller depended, therefore, upon the true state +of that balance. If the increase of peace establishments demanded of +Parliament agreed with the manifest appearance of the balance, +confidence in ministers as to the particulars would be very proper. If +the increase was not at all supported by any such appearance, he thought +great jealousy might be, and ought to be, entertained on that subject.</p> + +<p>That he did not find, on a review of all Europe, that, politically, we +stood in the smallest degree of danger from any one state or kingdom it +contained, nor that any other foreign powers than our own allies were +likely to obtain a considerable preponderance in the scale.</p> + +<p>That France had hitherto been our first object in all considerations +concerning the balance of power. The presence or absence of France +totally varied every sort of speculation relative to that balance.</p> + +<p>That France is at this time, in a political light, to be considered as +expunged out of the system of Europe. Whether she could ever appear in +it again, as a leading power, was not easy to determine; but at present +be considered France as not politically ex<a name="Page_215" id="Page_215" title="215" class="pagenum"></a>isting; and most assuredly it +would take up much time to restore her to her former active existence: +<i>Gallos quoque in bellis floruisse audivimus</i> might possibly be the +language of the rising generation. He did not mean to deny that it was +our duty to keep our eye on that nation, and to regulate our preparation +by the symptoms of her recovery.</p> + +<p>That it was to her <i>strength</i>, not to her <i>form of government</i>, which we +were to attend; because republics, as well as monarchies, were +susceptible of ambition, jealousy, and anger, the usual causes of war.</p> + +<p>But if, while France continued in this swoon, we should go on increasing +our expenses, we should certainly make ourselves less a match for her +when it became our concern to arm.</p> + +<p>It was said, that, as she had speedily fallen, she might speedily rise +again. He doubted this. That the fall from an height was with an +accelerated velocity; but to lift a weight up to that height again was +difficult, and opposed by the laws of physical and political +gravitation.</p> + +<p>In a political view, France was low indeed. She had lost everything, +even to her name.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Jacet ingens littore truncus,<br /></span> +<span>Avolsumque humeris <i>caput</i>, et sine <i>nomine</i> corpus.<a name="FNanchor_75_75" id="FNanchor_75_75"></a><a href="#Footnote_75_75" class="fnanchor" title=" Mr. Burke probably had in his mind the remainder of the +passage, and was filled with some congenial apprehensions:— + + +Hæc finis Priami fatorum; hic exitus illum +Sorte tulit, Trojam incensam et prolapsa videntem +Pergama, tot quondam populis terrisque superbum +Regnatorem Asiæ. Jacet ingens littore truncus, +Avolsumque humeris caput, et sine nomine corpus. +_At me_ tum primum sævus circumstetit horror. +Obstupui: _subiit chari genitoris imago_."> +[75]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="noindent">He was astonished at it; he was alarmed at it; he trembled at the +uncertainty of all human greatness.<a name="Page_216" id="Page_216" title="216" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>Since the House had been prorogued in the summer much work was done in +France. The French had shown themselves the ablest architects of ruin +that had hitherto existed in the world. In that very short space of time +they had completely pulled down to the ground their monarchy, their +church, their nobility, their law, their revenue, their army, their +navy, their commerce, their arts, and their manufactures. They had done +their business for us as rivals in a way in which twenty Ramillies or +Blenheims could never have done it. Were we absolute conquerors, and +France to lie prostrate at our feet, we should be ashamed to send a +commission to settle their affairs which could impose so hard a law upon +the French, and so destructive of all their consequence as a nation, as +that they had imposed upon themselves.</p> + +<p>France, by the mere circumstance of its vicinity, had been, and in a +degree always must be, an object of our vigilance, either with regard to +her actual power or to her influence and example. As to the former he +had spoken; as to the latter (her example) he should say a few words: +for by this example our friendship and our intercourse with that nation +had once been, and might again become, more dangerous to us than their +worst hostility.</p> + +<p>In the last century, Louis the Fourteenth had established a greater and +better disciplined military force than ever had been before seen in +Europe, and with it a perfect despotism. Though that despotism was +proudly arrayed in manners, gallantry, splendor, magnificence, and even +covered over with the imposing robes of science, literature, and arts, +it was, in government, nothing better than a painted and gilded +tyranny,—in religion, a hard, stern intolerance, the <a name="Page_217" id="Page_217" title="217" class="pagenum"></a>fit companion and +auxiliary to the despotic tyranny which prevailed in its government. The +same character of despotism insinuated itself into every court of +Europe,—the same spirit of disproportioned magnificence,—the same love +of standing armies, above the ability of the people. In particular, our +then sovereigns, King Charles and King James, fell in love with the +government of their neighbor, so flattering to the pride of kings. A +similarity of sentiments brought on connections equally dangerous to the +interests and liberties of their country. It were well that the +infection had gone no farther than the throne. The admiration of a +government flourishing and successful, unchecked in its operations, and +seeming, therefore, to compass its objects more speedily and +effectually, gained something upon all ranks of people. The good +patriots of that day, however, struggled against it. They sought nothing +more anxiously than to break off all communication with France, and to +beget a total alienation from its councils and its example,—which, by +the animosity prevalent between the abettors of their religious system +and the assertors of ours, was in some degree effected.</p> + +<p>This day the evil is totally changed in France: but there is an evil +there. The disease is altered; but the vicinity of the two countries +remains, and must remain; and the natural mental habits of mankind are +such, that the present distemper of France is far more likely to be +contagious than the old one: for it is not quite easy to spread a +passion for servitude among the people; but in all evils of the opposite +kind our natural inclinations are flattered. In the case of despotism, +there is the <i>fœdum crimen servitutis</i>:<a name="Page_218" id="Page_218" title="218" class="pagenum"></a> in the last, the <i>falsa SPECIES +libertatis</i>; and accordingly, as the historian says, <i>pronis auribus +accipitur</i>.</p> + +<p>In the last age we were in danger of being entangled by the example of +France in the net of a relentless despotism. It is not necessary to say +anything upon that example. It exists no longer. Our present danger from +the example of a people whose character knows no medium is, with regard +to government, a danger from anarchy: a danger of being led, through an +admiration of successful fraud and violence, to an imitation of the +excesses of an irrational, unprincipled, proscribing, confiscating, +plundering, ferocious, bloody, and tyrannical democracy. On the side of +religion, the danger of their example is no longer from intolerance, but +from atheism: a foul, unnatural vice, foe to all the dignity and +consolation of mankind; which seems in France, for a long time, to have +been embodied into a faction, accredited, and almost avowed.</p> + +<p>These are our present dangers from France. But, in his opinion, the very +worst part of the example set is in the late assumption of citizenship +by the army, and the whole of the arrangement, or rather disarrangement, +of their military.</p> + +<p>He was sorry that his right honorable friend (Mr. Fox) had dropped even +a word expressive of exultation on that circumstance, or that he seemed +of opinion that the objection from standing armies was at all lessened +by it. He attributed this opinion of Mr. Fox entirely to his known zeal +for the best of all causes, liberty. That it was with a pain +inexpressible he was obliged to have even the shadow of a difference +with his friend, whose authority would always be great with him, and +with all thinking people,—<a name="Page_219" id="Page_219" title="219" class="pagenum"></a><i>Quæ maxima semper censetur nobis, et</i> ERIT +<i>quæ maxima semper</i>;—his confidence in Mr. Fox was such, and so ample, +as to be almost implicit. That he was not ashamed to avow that degree of +docility. That, when the choice is well made, it strengthens, instead of +oppressing our intellect. That he who calls in the aid of an equal +understanding doubles his own. He who profits of a superior +understanding raises his powers to a level with the height of the +superior understanding he unites with. He had found the benefit of such +a junction, and would not lightly depart from it. He wished almost, on +all occasions, that his sentiments were understood to be conveyed in Mr. +Fox's words. And that he wished, as amongst the greatest benefits he +could wish the country, an eminent share of power to that right +honorable gentleman; because he knew that to his great and masterly +understanding he had joined the greatest possible degree of that natural +moderation which is the best corrective of power: that he was of the +most artless, candid, open, and benevolent disposition; disinterested in +the extreme; of a temper mild and placable even to a fault; without one +drop of gall in his whole constitution.</p> + +<p>That the House must perceive, from his coming forward to mark an +expression or two of his best friend, how anxious he was to keep the +distemper of France from the least countenance in England, where he was +sure some wicked persons had shown a strong disposition to recommend an +imitation of the French spirit of reform. He was so strongly opposed to +any the least tendency towards the <i>means</i> of introducing a democracy +like theirs, as well as to the <i>end</i> itself, that, much as it would +afflict him, if such a thing could be attempted, and that any friend <a name="Page_220" id="Page_220" title="220" class="pagenum"></a>of +his could concur in such measures, (he was far, very far, from believing +they could,) he would abandon his best friends, and join with his worst +enemies, to oppose either the means or the end,—and to resist all +violent exertions of the spirit of innovation, so distant from all +principles of true and safe reformation: a spirit well calculated to +overturn states, but perfectly unfit to amend them.</p> + +<p>That he was no enemy to reformation. Almost every business in which he +was much concerned, from the first day he sat in that House to that +hour, was a business of reformation; and when he had not been employed +in correcting, he had been employed in resisting abuses. Some traces of +this spirit in him now stand on their statute-book. In his opinion, +anything which unnecessarily tore to pieces the contexture of the state +not only prevented all real reformation, but introduced evils which +would call, but perhaps call in vain, for new reformation.</p> + +<p>That he thought the French nation very unwise. What they valued +themselves on was a disgrace to them. They had gloried (and some people +in England had thought fit to take share in that glory) in making a +Revolution, as if revolutions were good things in themselves. All the +horrors and all the crimes of the anarchy which led to their Revolution, +which attend its progress, and which may virtually attend it in its +establishment, pass for nothing with the lovers of revolutions. The +French have made their way, through the destruction of their country, to +a bad constitution, when they were absolutely in possession of a good +one. They were in possession of it the day the states met in separate +orders. Their business, had they been either virtuous or wise, or had +<a name="Page_221" id="Page_221" title="221" class="pagenum"></a>been left to their own judgment, was to secure the stability and +independence of the states, according to those orders, under the monarch +on the throne. It was then their duty to redress grievances.</p> + +<p>Instead of redressing grievances, and improving the fabric of their +state, to which they were called by their monarch and sent by their +country, they were made to take a very different course. They first +destroyed all the balances and counterpoises which serve to fix the +state and to give it a steady direction, and which furnish sure +correctives to any violent spirit which may prevail in any of the +orders. These balances existed in their oldest constitution, and in the +constitution of this country, and in the constitution of all the +countries in Europe. These they rashly destroyed, and then they melted +down the whole into one incongruous, ill-connected mass.</p> + +<p>When they had done this, they instantly, and with the most atrocious +perfidy and breach of all faith among men, laid the axe to the root of +all property, and consequently of all national prosperity, by the +principles they established and the example they set, in confiscating +all the possessions of the Church. They made and recorded a sort of +<i>institute</i> and <i>digest</i> of anarchy, called the Rights of Man, in such a +pedantic abuse of elementary principles as would have disgraced boys at +school: but this declaration of rights was worse than trifling and +pedantic in them; as by their name and authority they systematically +destroyed every hold of authority by opinion, religious or civil, on the +minds of the people. By this mad declaration they subverted the state, +and brought on such calamities as no country, without a long war, has +ever been known to suffer, and which may in <a name="Page_222" id="Page_222" title="222" class="pagenum"></a>the end produce such a war, +and perhaps many such.</p> + +<p>With them the question was not between despotism and liberty. The +sacrifice they made of the peace and power of their country was not made +on the altar of freedom. Freedom, and a better security for freedom than +that they have taken, they might have had without any sacrifice at all. +They brought themselves into all the calamities they suffer, not that +through them they might obtain a British constitution; they plunged +themselves headlong into those calamities to prevent themselves from +settling into that constitution, or into anything resembling it.</p> + +<p>That, if they should perfectly succeed in what they propose, as they are +likely enough to do, and establish a democracy, or a mob of democracies, +in a country circumstanced like France, they will establish a very bad +government,—a very bad species of tyranny.</p> + +<p>That the worst effect of all their proceeding was on their military, +which was rendered an army for every purpose but that of defence. That, +if the question was, whether soldiers were to forget they were citizens, +as an abstract proposition, he could have no difference about it; +though, as it is usual, when abstract principles are to be applied, much +was to be thought on the manner of uniting the character of citizen and +soldier. But as applied to the events which had happened in France, +where the abstract principle was clothed with its circumstances, he +thought that his friend would agree with him, that what was done there +furnished no matter of exultation, either in the act or the example. +These soldiers were not citizens, but base, hireling mutineers, and +<a name="Page_223" id="Page_223" title="223" class="pagenum"></a>mercenary, sordid deserters, wholly destitute of any honorable +principle. Their conduct was one of the fruits of that anarchic spirit +from the evils of which a democracy itself was to be resorted to, by +those who were the least disposed to that form, as a sort of refuge. It +was not an army in corps and with discipline, and embodied under the +respectable patriot citizens of the state in resisting tyranny. Nothing +like it. It was the case of common soldiers deserting from their +officers, to join a furious, licentious populace. It was a desertion to +a cause the real object of which was to level all those institutions, +and to break all those connections, natural and civil, that regulate and +hold together the community by a chain of subordination: to raise +soldiers against their officers, servants against their masters, +tradesmen against their customers, artificers against their employers, +tenants against their landlords, curates against their bishops, and +children against their parents. That this cause of theirs was not an +enemy to servitude, but to society.</p> + +<p>He wished the House to consider how the members would like to have their +mansions pulled down and pillaged, their persons abused, insulted, and +destroyed, their title-deeds brought out and burned before their faces, +and themselves and their families driven to seek refuge in every nation +throughout Europe, for no other reason than this, that, without any +fault of theirs, they were born gentlemen and men of property, and were +suspected of a desire to preserve their consideration and their estates. +The desertion in France was to aid an abominable sedition, the very +professed principle of which was an implacable hostility to nobility and +gentry, and whose savage war-whoop was, <i>"A l'Aristocrate!"</i>—by which +<a name="Page_224" id="Page_224" title="224" class="pagenum"></a>senseless, bloody cry they animated one another to rapine and murder; +whilst abetted by ambitious men of another class, they were crushing +everything respectable and virtuous in their nation, and to their power +disgracing almost every name by which we formerly knew there was such a +country in the world as France.</p> + +<p>He knew too well, and he felt as much as any man, how difficult it was +to accommodate a standing army to a free constitution, or to any +constitution. An armed disciplined body is, in its essence, dangerous to +liberty; undisciplined, it is ruinous to society. Its component parts +are in the latter case neither good citizens nor good soldiers. What +have they thought of in France, under such a difficulty as almost puts +the human faculties to a stand? They have put their army under such a +variety of principles of duty, that it is more likely to breed +litigants, pettifoggers, and mutineers than soldiers.<a name="FNanchor_76_76" id="FNanchor_76_76"></a><a href="#Footnote_76_76" class="fnanchor" title=" They are Sworn to obey the king, the nation, and the law.">[76]</a> They have set +up, to balance their crown army, another army, deriving under another +authority, called a municipal army,—a balance of armies, not of orders. +These latter they have destroyed with every mark of insult and +oppression. States may, and they will best, exist with a partition of +civil powers. Armies cannot exist under a divided command. This state of +things he thought in effect a state of war, or at best but a truce, +instead of peace, in the country.</p> + +<p>What a dreadful thing is a standing army for the conduct of the whole or +any part of which no man is responsible! In the present state of the +French crown army, is the crown responsible for the whole of it? Is +there any general who can be responsible for the obe<a name="Page_225" id="Page_225" title="225" class="pagenum"></a>dience of a +brigade, any colonel for that of a regiment, any captain for that of a +company? And as to the municipal army, reinforced as it is by the new +citizen deserters, under whose command are they? Have we not seen them, +not led by, but dragging, their nominal commander, with a rope about his +neck, when they, or those whom they accompanied, proceeded to the most +atrocious acts of treason and murder? Are any of these armies? Are any +of these citizens?</p> + +<p>We have in such a difficulty as that of fitting a standing army to the +state, he conceived, done much better. We have not distracted our army +by divided principles of obedience. We have put them under a single +authority, with a simple (our common) oath of fidelity; and we keep the +whole under our annual inspection. This was doing all that could be +safely done.</p> + +<p>He felt some concern that this strange thing called a Revolution in +France should be compared with the glorious event commonly called the +Revolution in England, and the conduct of the soldiery on that occasion +compared with the behavior of some of the troops of France in the +present instance. At that period, the Prince of Orange, a prince of the +blood-royal in England, was called in by the flower of the English +aristocracy to defend its ancient Constitution, and not to level all +distinctions. To this prince, so invited, the aristocratic leaders who +commanded the troops went over with their several corps, in bodies, to +the deliverer of their country. Aristocratic leaders brought up the +corps of citizens who newly enlisted in this cause. Military obedience +changed its object; but military discipline was not for a moment +inter<a name="Page_226" id="Page_226" title="226" class="pagenum"></a>rupted in its principle. The troops were ready for war, but +indisposed to mutiny.</p> + +<p>But as the conduct of the English armies was different, so was that of +the whole English nation at that time. In truth, the circumstances of +our Revolution (as it is called) and that of France are just the reverse +of each other in almost every particular, and in the whole spirit of the +transaction. With us it was the case of a legal monarch attempting +arbitrary power; in France it is the case of an arbitrary monarch +beginning, from whatever cause, to legalize his authority. The one was +to be resisted, the other was to be managed and directed; but in neither +case was the order of the state to be changed, lest government might be +ruined, which ought only to be corrected and legalized. With us we got +rid of the man, and preserved the constituent parts of the state. There +they get rid of the constituent parts of the state, and keep the man. +What we did was in truth and substance, and in a constitutional light, a +revolution, not made, but prevented. We took solid securities; we +settled doubtful questions; we corrected anomalies in our law. In the +stable, fundamental parts of our Constitution we made no +revolution,—no, nor any alteration at all. We did not impair the +monarchy. Perhaps it might be shown that we strengthened it very +considerably. The nation kept the same ranks, the same orders, the same +privileges, the same franchises, the same rules for property, the same +subordinations, the same order in the law, in the revenue, and in the +magistracy,—the same lords, the same commons, the same corporations, +the same electors.</p> + +<p>The Church was not impaired. Her estates, her majesty, her splendor, her +orders and gradations, con<a name="Page_227" id="Page_227" title="227" class="pagenum"></a>tinued the same. She was preserved in her +full efficiency, and cleared only of a certain intolerance, which was +her weakness and disgrace. The Church and the State were the same after +the Revolution that they were before, but better secured in every part.</p> + +<p>Was little done because a revolution was not made in the Constitution? +No! Everything was done; because we commenced with reparation, not with +ruin. Accordingly, the state flourished. Instead of lying as dead, in a +sort of trance, or exposed, as some others, in an epileptic fit, to the +pity or derision of the world, for her wild, ridiculous, convulsive +movements, impotent to every purpose but that of dashing out her brains +against the pavement, Great Britain rose above the standard even of her +former self. An era of a more improved domestic prosperity then +commenced, and still continues, not only unimpaired, but growing, under +the wasting hand of time. All the energies of the country were awakened. +England never preserved a firmer countenance or a more vigorous arm to +all her enemies and to all her rivals. Europe under her respired and +revived. Everywhere she appeared as the protector, assertor, or avenger +of liberty. A war was made and supported against fortune itself. The +treaty of Ryswick, which first limited the power of France, was soon +after made; the grand alliance very shortly followed, which shook to the +foundations the dreadful power which menaced the independence of +mankind. The states of Europe lay happy under the shade of a great and +free monarchy, which knew how to be great without endangering its own +peace at home or the internal or external peace of any of its +neighbors.<a name="Page_228" id="Page_228" title="228" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>Mr. Burke said he should have felt very unpleasantly, if he had not +delivered these sentiments. He was near the end of his natural, probably +still nearer the end of his political career. That he was weak and +weary, and wished for rest. That he was little disposed to +controversies, or what is called a detailed opposition. That at his time +of life, if he could not do something by some sort of weight of opinion, +natural or acquired, it was useless and indecorous to attempt anything +by mere struggle. <i>Turpe senex miles</i>. That he had for that reason +little attended the army business, or that of the revenue, or almost any +other matter of detail, for some years past. That he had, however, his +task. He was far from condemning such opposition; on the contrary, he +most highly applauded it, where a just occasion existed for it, and +gentlemen had vigor and capacity to pursue it. Where a great occasion +occurred, he was, and, while he continued in Parliament, would be, +amongst the most active and the most earnest,—as he hoped he had shown +on a late event. With respect to the Constitution itself, he wished few +alterations in it,—happy if he left it not the worse for any share he +had taken in its service.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>Mr. Fox then rose, and declared, in substance, that, so far as regarded +the French army, he went no farther than the general principle, by which +that army showed itself indisposed to be an instrument in the servitude +of their fellow-citizens, but did not enter into the particulars of +their conduct. He declared that he did not affect a democracy: that he +always thought any of the simple, unbalanced governments bad: simple +monarchy, simple aristocracy, <a name="Page_229" id="Page_229" title="229" class="pagenum"></a>simple democracy,—he held them all +imperfect or vicious; all were bad by themselves; the composition alone +was good. That these had been always his principles, in which he had +agreed with his friend Mr. Burke,—of whom he had said many kind and +flattering things, which Mr. Burke, I take it for granted, will know +himself too well to think he merits from anything but Mr. Fox's +acknowledged good-nature. Mr. Fox thought, however, that, in many cases, +Mr. Burke was rather carried too far by his hatred to innovation.</p> + +<p>Mr. Burke said, he well knew that these had been Mr. Fox's invariable +opinions; that they were a sure ground for the confidence of his +country. But he had been fearful that cabals of very different +intentions would be ready to make use of his great name, against his +character and sentiments, in order to derive a credit to their +destructive machinations.</p> + +<p>Mr. Sheridan then rose, and made a lively and eloquent speech against +Mr. Burke; in which, among other things, he said that Mr. Burke had +libelled the National Assembly of France, and had cast out reflections +on such characters as those of the Marquis de La Fayette and Mr. Bailly.</p> + +<p>Mr. Burke said, that he did not libel the National Assembly of France, +whom he considered very little in the discussion of these matters. That +he thought all the substantial power resided in the republic of Paris, +whose authority guided, or whose example was followed by, all the +republics of France. The republic of Paris had an army under their +orders, and not under those of the National Assembly.</p> + +<p>N.B. As to the particular gentlemen, I do not remember that Mr. Burke +mentioned either of them,—<a name="Page_230" id="Page_230" title="230" class="pagenum"></a>certainly not Mr. Bailly. He alluded, +undoubtedly, to the case of the Marquis de La Fayette; but whether what +he asserted of him be a libel on him must be left to those who are +acquainted with the business.</p> + +<p>Mr. Pitt concluded the debate with becoming gravity and dignity, and a +reserve on both sides of the question, as related to France, fit for a +person in a ministerial situation. He said, that what he had spoken only +regarded France when she should unite, which he rather thought she soon +might, with the liberty she had acquired, the blessings of law and +order. He, too, said several civil things concerning the sentiments of +Mr. Burke, as applied to this country.</p> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_75_75" id="Footnote_75_75" /><a href="#FNanchor_75_75"><span class="label">[75]</span></a> Mr. Burke probably had in his mind the remainder of the +passage, and was filled with some congenial apprehensions:— +</p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Hæc finis Priami fatorum; hic exitus illum<br /></span> +<span>Sorte tulit, Trojam incensam et prolapsa videntem<br /></span> +<span>Pergama, tot quondam populis terrisque superbum<br /></span> +<span>Regnatorem Asiæ. Jacet ingens littore truncus,<br /></span> +<span>Avolsumque humeris caput, et sine nomine corpus.<br /></span> +<span><i>At me</i> tum primum sævus circumstetit horror.<br /></span> +<span>Obstupui: <i>subiit chari genitoris imago</i>.<br /></span> +</div></div> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_76_76" id="Footnote_76_76" /><a href="#FNanchor_76_76"><span class="label">[76]</span></a> They are Sworn to obey the king, the nation, and the law.</p></div> +</div> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231" title="231" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<h2><a name="REFLECTIONS" id="REFLECTIONS" />REFLECTIONS<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 75%">ON THE</span><br /> +<br /> +REVOLUTION IN FRANCE,<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 75%">AND ON</span><br /> +<br /> +THE PROCEEDINGS IN CERTAIN SOCIETIES IN +LONDON RELATIVE TO THAT EVENT:<br /> +<br /> +IN A LETTER<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%">INTENDED TO HAVE BEEN SENT TO A GENTLEMAN IN PARIS.</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%">1790.</span></h2> +<p><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232" title="232" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<p><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233" title="233" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>It may not be unnecessary to inform the reader that the following +Reflections had their origin in a correspondence between the author and +a very young gentleman at Paris, who did him the honor of desiring his +opinion upon the important transactions which then, and ever since have, +so much occupied the attention of all men. An answer was written some +time in the month of October, 1789; but it was kept back upon prudential +considerations. That letter is alluded to in the beginning of the +following sheets. It has been since forwarded to the person to whom it +was addressed. The reasons for the delay in sending it were assigned in +a short letter to the same gentleman. This produced on his part a new +and pressing application for the author's sentiments.</p> + +<p>The author began a second and more full discussion on the subject. This +he had some thoughts of publishing early in the last spring; but the +matter gaining upon him, he found that what he had undertaken not only +far exceeded the measure of a letter, but that its importance required +rather a more detailed consideration than at that time he had any +leisure to bestow upon it. However, having thrown down his first +thoughts in the form of a letter, and, indeed, when he sat down to +write, having intended it for a private letter, he found it difficult to +change the form of address, when his sentiments had grown into a greater +extent and had received another direction. A different plan, he is +sensible, might be more favorable to a commodious division and +distribution of his matter.<a name="Page_234" id="Page_234" title="234" class="pagenum"></a></p> +<p><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235" title="235" class="pagenum"></a></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>REFLECTIONS<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%">ON</span><br /> +<br /> +THE REVOLUTION IN FRANCE.</h2> + + +<p>Dear Sir,—You are pleased to call again, and with some earnestness, for +my thoughts on the late proceedings in France. I will not give you +reason to imagine that I think my sentiments of such value as to wish +myself to be solicited about them. They are of too little consequence to +be very anxiously either communicated or withheld. It was from attention +to you, and to you only, that I hesitated at the time when you first +desired to receive them. In the first letter I had the honor to write to +you, and which at length I send, I wrote neither for nor from any +description of men; nor shall I in this. My errors, if any, are my own. +My reputation alone is to answer for them.</p> + +<p>You see, Sir, by the long letter I have transmitted to you, that, though +I do most heartily wish that France may be animated by a spirit of +rational liberty, and that I think you bound, in all honest policy, to +provide a permanent body in which that spirit may reside, and an +effectual organ by which it may act, it is my misfortune to entertain +great doubts concerning several material points in your late +transactions.</p> + +<p>You imagined, when you wrote last, that I might possibly be reckoned +among the approvers of certain <a name="Page_236" id="Page_236" title="236" class="pagenum"></a>proceedings in France, from the solemn +public seal of sanction they have received from two clubs of gentlemen +in London, called the Constitutional Society, and the Revolution +Society.</p> + +<p>I certainly have the honor to belong to more clubs than one in which the +Constitution of this kingdom and the principles of the glorious +Revolution are held in high reverence; and I reckon myself among the +most forward in my zeal for maintaining that Constitution and those +principles in their utmost purity and vigor. It is because I do so that +I think it necessary for me that there should be no mistake. Those who +cultivate the memory of our Revolution, and those who are attached to +the Constitution of this kingdom, will take good care how they are +involved with persons who, under the pretext of zeal towards the +Revolution and Constitution, too frequently wander from their true +principles, and are ready on every occasion to depart from the firm, but +cautious and deliberate, spirit which produced the one and which +presides in the other. Before I proceed to answer the more material +particulars in your letter, I shall beg leave to give you such +information as I have been able to obtain of the two clubs which have +thought proper, as bodies, to interfere in the concerns of +France,—first assuring you that I am not, and that I have never been, a +member of either of those societies.</p> + +<p>The first, calling itself the Constitutional Society, or Society for +Constitutional Information, or by some such title, is, I believe, of +seven or eight years' standing. The institution of this society appears +to be of a charitable, and so far of a laudable nature: it was intended +for the circulation, at the expense of the <a name="Page_237" id="Page_237" title="237" class="pagenum"></a>members, of many books which +few others would be at the expense of buying, and which might lie on the +hands of the booksellers, to the great loss of an useful body of men. +Whether the books so charitably circulated were ever as charitably read +is more than I know. Possibly several of them have been exported to +France, and, like goods not in request here, may with you have found a +market. I have heard much talk of the lights to be drawn from books that +are sent from hence. What improvements they have had in their passage +(as it is said some liquors are meliorated by crossing the sea) I cannot +tell; but I never heard a man of common judgment or the least degree of +information speak a word in praise of the greater part of the +publications circulated by that society; nor have their proceedings been +accounted, except by some of themselves, as of any serious consequence.</p> + +<p>Your National Assembly seems to entertain much the same opinion that I +do of this poor charitable club. As a nation, you reserved the whole +stock of your eloquent acknowledgments for the Revolution Society, when +their fellows in the Constitutional were in equity entitled to some +share. Since you have selected the Revolution Society as the great +object of your national thanks and praises, you will think me excusable +in making its late conduct the subject of my observations. The National +Assembly of France has given importance to these gentlemen by adopting +them; and they return the favor by acting as a committee in England for +extending the principles of the National Assembly. Henceforward we must +consider them as a kind of privileged persons, as no inconsiderable +members in the diplomatic <a name="Page_238" id="Page_238" title="238" class="pagenum"></a>body. This is one among the revolutions which +have given splendor to obscurity and distinction to undiscerned merit. +Until very lately I do not recollect to have heard of this club. I am +quite sure that it never occupied a moment of my thoughts,—nor, I +believe, those of any person out of their own set. I find, upon inquiry, +that, on the anniversary of the Revolution in 1688, a club of +Dissenters, but of what denomination I know not, have long had the +custom of hearing a sermon in one of their churches, and that afterwards +they spent the day cheerfully, as other clubs do, at the tavern. But I +never heard that any public measure or political system, much less that +the merits of the constitution of any foreign nation, had been the +subject of a formal proceeding at their festivals, until, to my +inexpressible surprise, I found them in a sort of public capacity, by a +congratulatory address, giving an authoritative sanction to the +proceedings of the National Assembly in France.</p> + +<p>In the ancient principles and conduct of the club, so far at least as +they were declared, I see nothing to which I could take exception. I +think it very probable, that, for some purpose, new members may have +entered among them,—and that some truly Christian politicians, who love +to dispense benefits, but are careful to conceal the hand which +distributes the dole, may have made them the instruments of their pious +designs. Whatever I may have reason to suspect concerning private +management, I shall speak of nothing as of a certainty but what is +public.</p> + +<p>For one, I should be sorry to be thought directly or indirectly +concerned in their proceedings. I certainly take my full share, along +with the rest of the <a name="Page_239" id="Page_239" title="239" class="pagenum"></a>world, in my individual and private capacity, in +speculating on what has been done, or is doing, on the public stage, in +any place, ancient or modern,—in the republic of Rome, or the republic +of Paris; but having no general apostolical mission, being a citizen of +a particular state, and being bound up, in a considerable degree, by its +public will, I should think it at least improper and irregular for me to +open a formal public correspondence with the actual government of a +foreign nation, without the express authority of the government under +which I live.</p> + +<p>I should be still more unwilling to enter into that correspondence under +anything like an equivocal description, which to many, unacquainted with +our usages, might make the address in which I joined appear as the act +of persons in some sort of corporate capacity, acknowledged by the laws +of this kingdom, and authorized to speak the sense of some part of it. +On account of the ambiguity and uncertainty of unauthorized general +descriptions, and of the deceit which may be practised under them, and +not from mere formality, the House of Commons would reject the most +sneaking petition for the most trifling object, under that mode of +signature to which you have thrown open the folding-doors of your +presence-chamber, and have ushered into your National Assembly with as +much ceremony and parade, and with as great a bustle of applause, as if +you had been visited by the whole representative majesty of the whole +English nation. If what this society has thought proper to send forth +had been a piece of argument, it would have signified little whose +argument it was. It would be neither the more nor the less convincing on +account of the party it came from. But this is<a name="Page_240" id="Page_240" title="240" class="pagenum"></a> only a vote and +resolution. It stands solely on authority; and in this case it is the +mere authority of individuals, few of whom appear. Their signatures +ought, in my opinion, to have been annexed to their instrument. The +world would then have the means of knowing how many they are, who they +are, and of what value their opinions may be, from their personal +abilities, from their knowledge, their experience, or their lead and +authority in this state. To me, who am but a plain man, the proceeding +looks a little too refined and too ingenious; it has too much the air of +a political stratagem, adopted for the sake of giving, under a +high-sounding name, an importance to the public declarations of this +club, which, when the matter came to be closely inspected, they did not +altogether so well deserve. It is a policy that has very much the +complexion of a fraud.</p> + +<p>I flatter myself that I love a manly, moral, regulated liberty as well +as any gentleman of that society, be he who he will; and perhaps I have +given as good proofs of my attachment to that cause, in the whole course +of my public conduct. I think I envy liberty as little as they do to any +other nation. But I cannot stand forward, and give praise or blame to +anything which relates to human actions and human concerns on a simple +view of the object, as it stands stripped of every relation, in all the +nakedness and solitude of metaphysical abstraction. Circumstances (which +with some gentlemen pass for nothing) give in reality to every political +principle its distinguishing color and discriminating effect. The +circumstances are what render every civil and political scheme +beneficial or noxious to mankind. Abstractedly speaking, government, as +well as liberty, is <a name="Page_241" id="Page_241" title="241" class="pagenum"></a>good; yet could I, in common sense, ten years ago, +have felicitated France on her enjoyment of a government, (for she then +had a government,) without inquiry what the nature of that government +was, or how it was administered? Can I now congratulate the same nation +upon its freedom? Is it because liberty in the abstract may be classed +amongst the blessings of mankind, that I am seriously to felicitate a +madman who has escaped from the protecting restraint and wholesome +darkness of his cell on his restoration to the enjoyment of light and +liberty? Am I to congratulate a highwayman and murderer who has broke +prison upon the recovery of his natural rights? This would be to act +over again the scene of the criminals condemned to the galleys, and +their heroic deliverer, the metaphysic Knight of the Sorrowful +Countenance.</p> + +<p>When I see the spirit of liberty in action, I see a strong principle at +work; and this, for a while, is all I can possibly know of it. The wild +gas, the fixed air, is plainly broke loose: but we ought to suspend our +judgment until the first effervescence is a little subsided, till the +liquor is cleared, and until we see something deeper than the agitation +of a troubled and frothy surface. I must be tolerably sure, before I +venture publicly to congratulate men upon a blessing, that they have +really received one. Flattery corrupts both the receiver and the giver; +and adulation is not of more service to the people than to kings. I +should therefore suspend my congratulations on the new liberty of +France, until I was informed how it had been combined with government, +with public force, with the discipline and obedience of armies, with the +collection of an effective and <a name="Page_242" id="Page_242" title="242" class="pagenum"></a>well-distributed revenue, with morality +and religion, with solidity and property, with peace and order, with +civil and social manners. All these (in their way) are good things, too; +and without them, liberty is not a benefit whilst it lasts, and is not +likely to continue long. The effect of liberty to individuals is, that +they may do what they please: we ought to see what it will please them +to do, before we risk congratulations, which may be soon turned into +complaints. Prudence would dictate this in the case of separate, +insulated, private men. But liberty, when men act in bodies, is <i>power</i>. +Considerate people, before they declare themselves, will observe the use +which is made of <i>power</i>,—and particularly of so trying a thing as +<i>new</i> power in <i>new</i> persons, of whose principles, tempers, and +dispositions they have little or no experience, and in situations where +those who appear the most stirring in the scene may possibly not be the +real movers.</p> + +<p>All these considerations, however, were below the transcendental dignity +of the Revolution Society. Whilst I continued in the country, from +whence I had the honor of writing to you, I had but an imperfect idea of +their transactions. On my coming to town, I sent for an account of their +proceedings, which had been published by their authority, containing a +sermon of Dr. Price, with the Duke de Rochefoucault's and the Archbishop +of Aix's letter and several other documents annexed. The whole of that +publication, with the manifest design of connecting the affairs of +France with those of England, by drawing us into an imitation of the +conduct of the National Assembly, gave me a considerable degree of +uneasiness. The effect of that conduct <a name="Page_243" id="Page_243" title="243" class="pagenum"></a>upon the power, credit, +prosperity, and tranquillity of France became every day more evident. +The form of constitution to be settled, for its future polity, became +more clear. We are now in a condition to discern with tolerable +exactness the true nature of the object held up to our imitation. If the +prudence of reserve and decorum dictates silence in some circumstances, +in others prudence of a higher order may justify us in speaking our +thoughts. The beginnings of confusion with us in England are at present +feeble enough; but with you we have seen an infancy still more feeble +growing by moments into a strength to heap mountains upon mountains, and +to wage war with Heaven itself. Whenever our neighbor's house is on +fire, it cannot be amiss for the engines to play a little on our own. +Better to be despised for too anxious apprehensions than ruined by too +confident a security.</p> + +<p>Solicitous chiefly for the peace of my own country, but by no means +unconcerned for yours, I wish to communicate more largely what was at +first intended only for your private satisfaction. I shall still keep +your affairs in my eye, and continue to address myself to you. Indulging +myself in the freedom of epistolary intercourse, I beg leave to throw +out my thoughts and express my feelings just as they arise in my mind, +with very little attention to formal method. I set out with the +proceedings of the Revolution Society; but I shall not confine myself to +them. Is it possible I should? It looks to me as if I were in a great +crisis, not of the affairs of France alone, but of all Europe, perhaps +of more than Europe. All circumstances taken together, the French +Revolution is the most astonishing that has <a name="Page_244" id="Page_244" title="244" class="pagenum"></a>hitherto happened in the +world. The most wonderful things are brought about in many instances by +means the most absurd and ridiculous, in the most ridiculous modes, and +apparently by the most contemptible instruments. Everything seems out of +nature in this strange chaos of levity and ferocity, and of all sorts of +crimes jumbled together with all sorts of follies. In viewing this +monstrous tragi-comic scene, the most opposite passions necessarily +succeed and sometimes mix with each other in the mind: alternate +contempt and indignation, alternate laughter and tears, alternate scorn +and horror.</p> + +<p>It cannot, however, be denied that to some this strange scene appeared +in quite another point of view. Into them it inspired no other +sentiments than those of exultation and rapture. They saw nothing in +what has been done in France but a firm and temperate exertion of +freedom,—so consistent, on the whole, with morals and with piety as to +make it deserving not only of the secular applause of dashing +Machiavelian politicians, but to render it a fit theme for all the +devout effusions of sacred eloquence.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>On the forenoon of the fourth of November last, Doctor Richard Price, a +Non-Conforming minister of eminence, preached at the Dissenting +meeting-house of the Old Jewry, to his club or society, a very +extraordinary miscellaneous sermon, in which there are some good moral +and religious sentiments, and not ill expressed, mixed up with a sort of +porridge of various political opinions and reflections: but the +Revolution in France is the grand ingredient in the caldron. I consider +the address transmitted by the Revolution Society to the National +Assembly, through <a name="Page_245" id="Page_245" title="245" class="pagenum"></a>Earl Stanhope, as originating in the principles of +the sermon, and as a corollary from them. It was moved by the preacher +of that discourse. It was passed by those who came reeking from the +effect of the sermon, without any censure or qualification, expressed or +implied. If, however, any of the gentlemen concerned shall wish to +separate the sermon from the resolution, they know how to acknowledge +the one and to disavow the other. They may do it: I cannot.</p> + +<p>For my part, I looked on that sermon as the public declaration of a man +much connected with literary caballers and intriguing philosophers, with +political theologians and theological politicians, both at home and +abroad. I know they set him up as a sort of oracle; because, with the +best intentions in the world, he naturally <i>philippizes</i>, and chants his +prophetic song in exact unison with their designs.</p> + +<p>That sermon is in a strain which I believe has not been heard in this +kingdom, in any of the pulpits which are tolerated or encouraged in it, +since the year 1648,—when a predecessor of Dr. Price, the Reverend Hugh +Peters, made the vault of the king's own chapel at St. James's ring with +the honor and privilege of the saints, who, with the "high praises of +God in their mouths, and a <i>two</i>-edged sword in their hands, were to +execute judgment on the heathen, and punishments upon the <i>people</i>; to +bind their <i>kings</i> with chains, and their <i>nobles</i> with fetters of +iron."<a name="FNanchor_77_77" id="FNanchor_77_77"></a><a href="#Footnote_77_77" class="fnanchor" title=" Ps. cxlix.">[77]</a> Few harangues from the pulpit, except in the days of your +League in France, or in the days of our Solemn League and Covenant in +England, have ever breathed less of the spirit of moderation than <a name="Page_246" id="Page_246" title="246" class="pagenum"></a>this +lecture in the Old Jewry. Supposing, however, that something like +moderation were visible in this political sermon, yet politics and the +pulpit are terms that have little agreement. No sound ought to be heard +in the church but the healing voice of Christian charity. The cause of +civil liberty and civil government gains as little as that of religion +by this confusion of duties. Those who quit their proper character to +assume what does not belong to them are, for the greater part, ignorant +both of the character they leave and of the character they assume. +Wholly unacquainted with the world, in which they are so fond of +meddling, and inexperienced in all its affairs, on which they pronounce +with so much confidence, they have nothing of politics but the passions +they excite. Surely the church is a place where one day's truce ought to +be allowed to the dissensions and animosities of mankind.</p> + +<p>This pulpit style, revived after so long a discontinuance, had to me the +air of novelty, and of a novelty not wholly without danger. I do not +charge this danger equally to every part of the discourse. The hint +given to a noble and reverend lay-divine, who is supposed high in office +in one of our universities,<a name="FNanchor_78_78" id="FNanchor_78_78"></a><a href="#Footnote_78_78" class="fnanchor" title=" Discourse on the Love of our Country, Nov. 4, 1789, by Dr. +Richard Price, 3d edition, p. 17 and 18.">[78]</a> and other lay-divines "of <i>rank</i> and +literature," may be proper and seasonable, though somewhat new. If the +noble <i>Seekers</i> should find nothing to satisfy their pious fancies in +the old staple of the national Church, or in all the rich variety to be +found in the well-assorted warehouses of the Dissenting congregations, +Dr. Price advises them to improve upon Non-Conformity, and to set up, +each of them, a separate meeting-house <a name="Page_247" id="Page_247" title="247" class="pagenum"></a>upon his own particular +principles.<a name="FNanchor_79_79" id="FNanchor_79_79"></a><a href="#Footnote_79_79" class="fnanchor" title=" "Those who dislike that mode of worship which is +prescribed by public authority ought, if they can find _no_ worship +_out_ of the Church which they approve, _to set up a separate worship +for themselves_; and by doing this, and giving an example of a rational +and manly worship, men of _weight_ from their _rank_ and literature may +do the greatest service to society and the world."—P. 18, Dr. Price's +Sermon.">[79]</a> It is somewhat remarkable that this reverend divine +should be so earnest for setting up new churches, and so perfectly +indifferent concerning the doctrine which may be taught in them. His +zeal is of a curious character. It is not for the propagation of his own +opinions, but of any opinions. It is not for the diffusion of truth, but +for the spreading of contradiction. Let the noble teachers but dissent, +it is no matter from whom or from what. This great point once secured, +it is taken for granted their religion will be rational and manly. I +doubt whether religion would reap all the benefits which the calculating +divine computes from this "great company of great preachers." It would +certainly be a valuable addition of nondescripts to the ample collection +of known classes, genera, and species, which at present beautify the +<i>hortus siccus</i> of Dissent. A sermon from a noble duke, or a noble +marquis, or a noble earl, or baron bold, would certainly increase and +diversify the amusements of this town, which begins to grow satiated +with the uniform round of its vapid dissipations. I should only +stipulate that these new <i>Mess-Johns</i> in robes and coronets should keep +some sort of bounds in the democratic and levelling principles which are +expected from their titled pulpits. The new evangelists will, I dare +say, disappoint the hopes that are conceived of them. They will not +become, literally as well as figuratively, <a name="Page_248" id="Page_248" title="248" class="pagenum"></a>polemic divines,—nor be +disposed so to drill their congregations, that they may, as in former +blessed times, preach their doctrines to regiments of dragoons and corps +of infantry and artillery. Such arrangements, however favorable to the +cause of compulsory freedom, civil and religious, may not be equally +conducive to the national tranquillity. These few restrictions I hope +are no great stretches of intolerance, no very violent exertions of +despotism.</p> + +<p>But I may say of our preacher, "<i>Utinam nugis tota illa dedisset et +tempora sævitiæ</i>." All things in this his fulminating bull are not of so +innoxious a tendency. His doctrines affect our Constitution in its vital +parts. He tells the Revolution Society, in this political sermon, that +his Majesty "is almost the <i>only</i> lawful king in the world, because the +<i>only</i> one who owes his crown to <i>the choice of his people</i>." As to the +kings of <i>the world</i>, all of whom (except one) this arch-pontiff of the +<i>rights of men</i>, with all the plenitude and with more than the boldness +of the Papal deposing power in its meridian fervor of the twelfth +century, puts into one sweeping clause of ban and anathema, and +proclaims usurpers by circles of longitude and latitude over the whole +globe, it behooves them to consider how they admit into their +territories these apostolic missionaries, who are to tell their subjects +they are not lawful kings. That is their concern. It is ours, as a +domestic interest of some moment, seriously to consider the solidity of +the <i>only</i> principle upon which these gentlemen acknowledge a king of +Great Britain to be entitled to their allegiance.</p> + +<p>This doctrine, as applied to the prince now on the British throne, +either is nonsense, and therefore neither true nor false, or it affirms +a most unfounded, <a name="Page_249" id="Page_249" title="249" class="pagenum"></a>dangerous, illegal, and unconstitutional position. +According to this spiritual doctor of politics, if his Majesty does not +owe his crown to the choice of his people, he is no <i>lawful</i> king. Now +nothing can be more untrue than that the crown of this kingdom is so +held by his Majesty. Therefore, if you follow their rule, the king of +Great Britain, who most certainly does not owe his high office to any +form of popular election, is in no respect better than the rest of the +gang of usurpers, who reign, or rather rob, all over the face of this +our miserable world, without any sort of right or title to the +allegiance of their people. The policy of this general doctrine, so +qualified, is evident enough. The propagators of this political gospel +are in hopes their abstract principle (their principle that a popular +choice is necessary to the legal existence of the sovereign magistracy) +would be overlooked, whilst the king of Great Britain was not affected +by it. In the mean time the ears of their congregations would be +gradually habituated to it, as if it were a first principle admitted +without dispute. For the present it would only operate as a theory, +pickled in the preserving juices of pulpit eloquence, and laid by for +future use. <i>Condo et compono quæ mox depromere passim</i>. By this policy, +whilst our government is soothed with a reservation in its favor, to +which it has no claim, the security which it has in common with all +governments, so far as opinion is security, is taken away.</p> + +<p>Thus these politicians proceed, whilst little notice is taken of their +doctrines; but when they come to be examined upon the plain meaning of +their words and the direct tendency of their doctrines, then +equivocations and slippery constructions come into play.<a name="Page_250" id="Page_250" title="250" class="pagenum"></a> When they say +the king owes his crown to the choice of his people, and is therefore +the only lawful sovereign in the world, they will perhaps tell us they +mean to say no more than that some of the king's predecessors have been +called to the throne by some sort of choice, and therefore he owes his +crown to the choice of his people. Thus, by a miserable subterfuge, they +hope to render their proposition safe by rendering it nugatory. They are +welcome to the asylum they seek for their offence, since they take +refuge in their folly. For, if you admit this interpretation, how does +their idea of election differ from our idea of inheritance? And how does +the settlement of the crown in the Brunswick line, derived from James +the First, come to legalize our monarchy rather than that of any of the +neighboring countries? At some time or other, to be sure, all the +beginners of dynasties were chosen by those who called them to govern. +There is ground enough for the opinion that all the kingdoms of Europe +were at a remote period elective, with more or fewer limitations in the +objects of choice. But whatever kings might have been here or elsewhere +a thousand years ago, or in whatever manner the ruling dynasties of +England or France may have begun, the king of Great Britain is at this +day king by a fixed rule of succession, according to the laws of his +country; and whilst the legal conditions of the compact of sovereignty +are performed by him, (as they are performed,) he holds his crown in +contempt of the choice of the Revolution Society, who have not a single +vote for a king amongst them, either individually or collectively: +though I make no doubt they would soon erect themselves into an +electoral college, if things were ripe to <a name="Page_251" id="Page_251" title="251" class="pagenum"></a>give effect to their claim. +His Majesty's heirs and successors, each in his time and order, will +come to the crown with the same contempt of their choice with which his +Majesty has succeeded to that he wears.</p> + +<p>Whatever may be the success of evasion in explaining away the gross +error <i>fact</i>, which supposes that his Majesty (though he holds it in +concurrence with the wishes) owes his crown to the choice of his people, +yet nothing can evade their full, explicit declaration concerning the +principle of a right in the people to choose,—which right is directly +maintained, and tenaciously adhered to. All the oblique insinuations +concerning election bottom in this proposition, and are referable to it. +Lest the foundation of the king's exclusive legal title should pass for +a mere rant of adulatory freedom, the political divine proceeds +dogmatically to assert,<a name="FNanchor_80_80" id="FNanchor_80_80"></a><a href="#Footnote_80_80" class="fnanchor" title=" P. 34, Discourse on the Love of our Country, by Dr. +Price.">[80]</a> that, by the principles of the Revolution, +the people of England have acquired three fundamental rights, all of +which, with him, compose one system, and lie together in one short +sentence: namely, that we have acquired a right</p> + +<p>1. "To choose our own governors."</p> + +<p>2. "To cashier them for misconduct."</p> + +<p>3. "To frame a government for ourselves."</p> + +<p class="noindent">This new, and hitherto unheard-of bill of rights, though made in the +name of the whole people, belongs to those gentlemen and their faction +only. The body of the people of England have no share in it. They +utterly disclaim it. They will resist the practical assertion of it with +their lives and fortunes. They are bound to do so by the laws of their +country, made at the time of that very Revolution which <a name="Page_252" id="Page_252" title="252" class="pagenum"></a>is appealed to +in favor of the fictitious rights claimed by the society which abuses +its name.</p> + +<p>These gentlemen of the Old Jewry, in all their reasonings on the +Revolution of 1688, have a revolution which happened in England about +forty years before, and the late French Revolution, so much before their +eyes and in their hearts, that they are constantly confounding all the +three together. It is necessary that we should separate what they +confound. We must recall their erring fancies to the <i>acts</i> of the +Revolution which we revere, for the discovery of its true <i>principles</i>. +If the <i>principles</i> of the Revolution of 1688 are anywhere to be found, +it is in the statute called the <i>Declaration of Right</i>. In that most +wise, sober, and considerate declaration, drawn up by great lawyers and +great statesmen, and not by warm and inexperienced enthusiasts, not one +word is said, nor one suggestion made, of a general right "to choose our +own <i>governors</i>, to cashier them for misconduct, and to <i>form</i> a +government for <i>ourselves</i>."</p> + +<p>This Declaration of Right (the act of the 1st of William and Mary, sess. +2, ch. 2) is the corner-stone of our Constitution, as reinforced, +explained, improved, and in its fundamental principles forever settled. +It is called "An act for declaring the rights and liberties of the +subject, and for <i>settling</i> the <i>succession</i> of the crown." You will +observe that these rights and this succession are declared in one body, +and bound indissolubly together.</p> + +<p>A few years after this period, a second opportunity offered for +asserting a right of election to the crown. On the prospect of a total +failure of issue from King William, and from the princess, afterwards +Queen<a name="Page_253" id="Page_253" title="253" class="pagenum"></a> Anne, the consideration of the settlement of the Crown, and of a +further security for the liberties of the people, again came before the +legislature. Did they this second time make any provision for legalizing +the crown on the spurious Revolution principles of the Old Jewry? No. +They followed the principles which prevailed in the Declaration of +Right; indicating with more precision the persons who were to inherit in +the Protestant line. This act also incorporated, by the same policy, our +liberties and an hereditary succession in the same act. Instead of a +right to choose our own governors, they declared that the <i>succession</i> +in that line (the Protestant line drawn from James the First) was +absolutely necessary "for the peace, quiet, and security of the realm," +and that it was equally urgent on them "to maintain a <i>certainty in the +succession</i> thereof, to which the subjects may safely have recourse for +their protection." Both these acts, in which are heard the unerring, +unambiguous oracles of Revolution policy, instead of countenancing the +delusive gypsy predictions of a "right to choose our governors," prove +to a demonstration how totally adverse the wisdom of the nation was from +turning a case of necessity into a rule of law.</p> + +<p>Unquestionably there was at the Revolution, in the person of King +William, a small and a temporary deviation from the strict order of a +regular hereditary succession; but it is against all genuine principles +of jurisprudence to draw a principle from a law made in a special case +and regarding an individual person. <i>Privilegium non transit in +exemplum</i>. If ever there was a time favorable for establishing the +principle that a king of popular choice was the only legal king, without +all doubt it was at the Revolution. Its not <a name="Page_254" id="Page_254" title="254" class="pagenum"></a>being done at that time is +a proof that the nation was of opinion it ought not to be done at any +time. There is no person so completely ignorant of our history as not to +know that the majority in Parliament, of both parties, were so little +disposed to anything resembling that principle, that at first they were +determined to place the vacant crown, not on the head of the Prince of +Orange, but on that of his wife, Mary, daughter of King James, the +eldest born of the issue of that king, which they acknowledged as +undoubtedly his. It would be to repeat a very trite story, to recall to +your memory all those circumstances which demonstrated that their +accepting King William was not properly a <i>choice</i>; but to all those who +did not wish in effect to recall King James, or to deluge their country +in blood, and again to bring their religion, laws, and liberties into +the peril they had just escaped, it was an act of <i>necessity</i>, in the +strictest moral sense in which necessity can be taken.</p> + +<p>In the very act in which, for a time, and in a single case, Parliament +departed from the strict order of inheritance, in favor of a prince who, +though not next, was, however, very near in the line of succession, it +is curious to observe how Lord Somers, who drew the bill called the +Declaration of Right, has comported himself on that delicate occasion. +It is curious to observe with what address this temporary solution of +continuity is kept from the eye; whilst all that could be found in this +act of necessity to countenance the idea of an hereditary succession is +brought forward, and fostered, and made the most of, by this great man, +and by the legislature who followed him. Quitting the dry, imperative +style of an act of Parliament, he makes the Lords and Commons fall to a +<a name="Page_255" id="Page_255" title="255" class="pagenum"></a>pious legislative ejaculation, and declare that they consider it "as a +marvellous providence, and merciful goodness of God to this nation, to +preserve their said Majesties' <i>royal</i> persons most happily to reign +over us <i>on the throne of their ancestors</i>, for which, from the bottom +of their hearts, they return their humblest thanks and praises." The +legislature plainly had in view the Act of Recognition of the first of +Queen Elizabeth, chap. 3rd, and of that of James the First, chap. 1st, +both acts strongly declaratory of the inheritable nature of the crown; +and in many parts they follow, with a nearly literal precision, the +words, and even the form of thanksgiving which is found in these old +declaratory statutes.</p> + +<p>The two Houses, in the act of King William, did not thank God that they +had found a fair opportunity to assert a right to choose their own +governors, much less to make an election the <i>only lawful</i> title to the +crown. Their having been in a condition to avoid the very appearance of +it, as much as possible, was by them considered as a providential +escape. They threw a politic, well-wrought veil over every circumstance +tending to weaken the rights which in the meliorated order of succession +they meant to perpetuate, or which might furnish a precedent for any +future departure from what they had then settled forever. Accordingly, +that they might not relax the nerves of their monarchy, and that they +might preserve a close conformity to the practice of their ancestors, as +it appeared in the declaratory statutes of Queen Mary<a name="FNanchor_81_81" id="FNanchor_81_81"></a><a href="#Footnote_81_81" class="fnanchor" title=" 1st Mary, sess. 3, ch. 1.">[81]</a> and Queen +Elizabeth, in the next clause they vest, by recognition, in their +Majesties <i>all</i> the legal prerogatives of the crown, declaring<a name="Page_256" id="Page_256" title="256" class="pagenum"></a> "that in +them they are most <i>fully</i>, rightfully, and <i>entirely</i> invested, +incorporated, united, and annexed." In the clause which follows, for +preventing questions, by reason of any pretended titles to the crown, +they declare (observing also in this the traditionary language, along +with the traditionary policy of the nation, and repeating as from a +rubric the language of the preceding acts of Elizabeth and James) that +on the preserving "a <i>certainty</i> in the SUCCESSION thereof the unity, +peace, and tranquillity of this nation doth, under God, wholly depend."</p> + +<p>They knew that a doubtful title of succession would but too much +resemble an election, and that an election would be utterly destructive +of the "unity, peace, and tranquillity of this nation," which they +thought to be considerations of some moment. To provide for these +objects, and therefore to exclude forever the Old Jewry doctrine of "a +right to choose our own governors," they follow with a clause containing +a most solemn pledge, taken from the preceding act of Queen +Elizabeth,—as solemn a pledge as ever was or can be given in favor of +an hereditary succession, and as solemn a renunciation as could be made +of the principles by this society imputed to them:—"The Lords Spiritual +and Temporal, and Commons, do, in the name of all the people aforesaid, +most humbly and faithfully submit <i>themselves, their heirs, and +posterities forever</i>; and do faithfully promise that they will stand to, +maintain, and defend their said Majesties, and also the <i>limitation of +the crown</i>, herein specified and contained, to the utmost of their +powers," &c., &c.</p> + +<p>So far is it from being true that we acquired a right by the Revolution +to elect our kings, that, if <a name="Page_257" id="Page_257" title="257" class="pagenum"></a>we had possessed it before, the English +nation did at that time most solemnly renounce and abdicate it, for +themselves, and for all their posterity forever. These gentlemen may +value themselves as much as they please on their Whig principles; but I +never desire to be thought a better Whig than Lord Somers, or to +understand the principles of the Revolution better than those by whom it +was brought about, or to read in the Declaration of Right any mysteries +unknown to those whose penetrating style has engraved in our ordinances, +and in our hearts, the words and spirit of that immortal law.</p> + +<p>It is true, that, aided with the powers derived from force and +opportunity, the nation was at that time, in some sense, free to take +what course it pleased for filling the throne,—but only free to do so +upon the same grounds on which they might have wholly abolished their +monarchy, and every other part of their Constitution. However, they did +not think such bold changes within their commission. It is, indeed, +difficult, perhaps impossible, to give limits to the mere <i>abstract</i> +competence of the supreme power, such as was exercised by Parliament at +that time; but the limits of a <i>moral</i> competence, subjecting, even in +powers more indisputably sovereign, occasional will to permanent reason, +and to the steady maxims of faith, justice, and fixed fundamental +policy, are perfectly intelligible, and perfectly binding upon those who +exercise any authority, under any name, or under any title, in the +state. The House of Lords, for instance, is not morally competent to +dissolve the House of Commons,—no, nor even to dissolve itself, nor to +abdicate, if it would, its portion in the legislature of the kingdom. +Though a king may abdicate <a name="Page_258" id="Page_258" title="258" class="pagenum"></a>for his own person, he cannot abdicate for +the monarchy. By as strong, or by a stronger reason, the House of +Commons cannot renounce its share of authority. The engagement and pact +of society, which generally goes by the name of the Constitution, +forbids such invasion and such surrender. The constituent parts of a +state are obliged to hold their public faith with each other, and with +all those who derive any serious interest under their engagements, as +much as the whole state is bound to keep its faith with separate +communities: otherwise, competence and power would soon be confounded, +and no law be left but the will of a prevailing force. On this +principle, the succession of the crown has always been what it now is, +an hereditary succession by law: in the old line it was a succession by +the Common Law; in the new by the statute law, operating on the +principles of the Common Law, not changing the substance, but regulating +the mode and describing the persons. Both these descriptions of law are +of the same force, and are derived from an equal authority, emanating +from the common agreement and original compact of the state, <i>communi +sponsione reipublicæ</i>, and as such are equally binding on king, and +people too, as long as the terms are observed, and they continue the +same body politic.</p> + +<p>It is far from impossible to reconcile, if we do not suffer ourselves to +be entangled in the mazes of metaphysic sophistry, the use both of a +fixed rule and an occasional deviation,—the sacredness of an hereditary +principle of succession in our government with a power of change in its +application in cases of extreme emergency. Even in that extremity, (if +we take the measure of our rights by our exercise of them at the<a name="Page_259" id="Page_259" title="259" class="pagenum"></a> +Revolution,) the change is to be confined to the peccant part only,—to +the part which produced the necessary deviation; and even then it is to +be effected without a decomposition of the whole civil and political +mass, for the purpose of originating a new civil order out of the first +elements of society.</p> + +<p>A state without the means of some change is without the means of its +conservation. Without such means it might even risk the loss of that +part of the Constitution which it wished the most religiously to +preserve. The two principles of conservation and correction operated +strongly at the two critical periods of the Restoration and Revolution, +when England found itself without a king. At both those periods the +nation had lost the bond of union in their ancient edifice: they did +not, however, dissolve the whole fabric. On the contrary, in both cases +they regenerated the deficient part of the old Constitution through the +parts which were not impaired. They kept these old parts exactly as they +were, that the part recovered might be suited to them. They acted by the +ancient organized states in the shape of their old organization, and not +by the organic <i>moleculæ</i> of a disbanded people. At no time, perhaps, +did the sovereign legislature manifest a more tender regard to that +fundamental principle of British constitutional policy than at the time +of the Revolution, when it deviated from the direct line of hereditary +succession. The crown was carried somewhat out of the line in which it +had before moved; but the new line was derived from the same stock. It +was still a line of hereditary descent; still an hereditary descent in +the same blood, though an hereditary descent qualified with +Protestantism. When the legislature altered <a name="Page_260" id="Page_260" title="260" class="pagenum"></a>the direction, but kept the +principle, they showed that they held it inviolable.</p> + +<p>On this principle, the law of inheritance had admitted some amendment in +the old time, and long before the era of the Revolution. Some time after +the Conquest great questions arose upon the legal principles of +hereditary descent. It became a matter of doubt whether the heir <i>per +capita</i> or the heir <i>per stirpes</i> was to succeed; but whether the heir +<i>per capita</i> gave way when the heirdom <i>per stirpes</i> took place, or the +Catholic heir when the Protestant was preferred, the inheritable +principle survived with a sort of immortality through all +transmigrations,—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i9">Multosque per annos<br /></span> +<span>Stat fortuna domûs, et avi numerantur avorum.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="noindent">This is the spirit of our Constitution, not only in its settled course, +but in all its revolutions. Whoever came in, or however he came in, +whether he obtained the crown by law or by force, the hereditary +succession was either continued or adopted.</p> + +<p>The gentlemen of the Society for Revolutions see nothing in that of 1688 +but the deviation from the Constitution; and they take the deviation +from the principle for the principle. They have little regard to the +obvious consequences of their doctrine, though they may see that it +leaves positive authority in very few of the positive institutions of +this country. When such an unwarrantable maxim is once established, that +no throne is lawful but the elective, no one act of the princes who +preceded this era of fictitious election can be valid. Do these +theorists mean to imitate some of their predecessors, who dragged the +bodies of our ancient sovereigns out of the quiet of their tombs? Do +they mean to attaint and disable back<a name="Page_261" id="Page_261" title="261" class="pagenum"></a>wards all the kings that have +reigned before the Revolution, and consequently to stain the throne of +England with the blot of a continual usurpation? Do they mean to +invalidate, annul, or to call into question, together with the titles of +the whole line of our kings, that great body of our statute law which +passed under those whom they treat as usurpers? to annul laws of +inestimable value to our liberties,—of as great value at least as any +which have passed at or since the period of the Revolution? If kings who +did not owe their crown to the choice of their people had no title to +make laws, what will become of the statute <i>De tallagio non concedendo?</i> +of the <i>Petition of Right?</i> of the act of <i>Habeas Corpus?</i> Do these new +doctors of the rights of men presume to assert that King James the +Second, who came to the crown as next of blood, according to the rules +of a then unqualified succession, was not to all intents and purposes a +lawful king of England, before he had done any of those acts which were +justly construed into an abdication of his crown? If he was not, much +trouble in Parliament might have been saved at the period these +gentlemen commemorate. But King James was a bad king with a good title, +and not an usurper. The princes who succeeded according to the act of +Parliament which settled the crown on the Electress Sophia and on her +descendants, being Protestants, came in as much by a title of +inheritance as King James did. He came in according to the law, as it +stood at his accession to the crown; and the princes of the House of +Brunswick came to the inheritance of the crown, not by election, but by +the law, as it stood at their several accessions, of Protestant descent +and inheritance, as I hope I have shown sufficiently.<a name="Page_262" id="Page_262" title="262" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>The law by which this royal family is specifically destined to the +succession is the act of the 12th and 13th of King William. The terms of +this act bind "us, and our <i>heirs</i>, and our <i>posterity</i>, to them, their +<i>heirs</i>, and their <i>posterity</i>," being Protestants, to the end of time, +in the same words as the Declaration of Right had bound us to the heirs +of King William and Queen Mary. It therefore secures both an hereditary +crown and an hereditary allegiance. On what ground, except the +constitutional policy of forming an establishment to secure that kind of +succession which is to preclude a choice of the people forever, could +the legislature have fastidiously rejected the fair and abundant choice +which our own country presented to them, and searched in strange lands +for a foreign princess, from whose womb the line of our future rulers +were to derive their title to govern millions of men through a series of +ages?</p> + +<p>The Princess Sophia was named in the act of settlement of the 12th and +13th of King William, for a <i>stock</i> and root of <i>inheritance</i> to our +kings, and not for her merits as a temporary administratrix of a power +which she might not, and in fact did not, herself ever exercise. She was +adopted for one reason, and for one only,—because, says the act, "the +most excellent Princess Sophia, Electress and Duchess Dowager of +Hanover, is <i>daughter</i> of the most excellent Princess Elizabeth, late +Queen of Bohemia, <i>daughter</i> of our late <i>sovereign lord</i> King James the +First, of happy memory, and is hereby declared to be the next in +<i>succession</i> in the Protestant line," &c., &c.; "and the crown shall +continue to the <i>heirs</i> of her body, being Protestants." This limitation +was made by Parliament, that through the Princess<a name="Page_263" id="Page_263" title="263" class="pagenum"></a> Sophia an inheritable +line not only was to be continued in future, but (what they thought very +material) that through her it was to be connected with the old stock of +inheritance in King James the First; in order that the monarchy might +preserve an unbroken unity through all ages, and might be preserved +(with safety to our religion) in the old approved mode by descent, in +which, if our liberties had been once endangered, they had often, +through all storms and struggles of prerogative and privilege, been +preserved. They did well. No experience has taught us that in any other +course or method than that of an <i>hereditary crown</i> our liberties can be +regularly perpetuated and preserved sacred as our <i>hereditary right</i>. An +irregular, convulsive movement may be necessary to throw off an +irregular, convulsive disease. But the course of succession is the +healthy habit of the British Constitution. Was it that the legislature +wanted, at the act for the limitation of the crown in the Hanoverian +line, drawn through the female descendants of James the First, a due +sense of the inconveniences of having two or three, or possibly more, +foreigners in succession to the British throne? No!—they had a due +sense of the evils which might happen from such foreign rule, and more +than a due sense of them. But a more decisive proof cannot be given of +the full conviction of the British nation that the principles of the +Revolution did not authorize them to elect kings at their pleasure, and +without any attention to the ancient fundamental principles of our +government, than their continuing to adopt a plan of hereditary +Protestant succession in the old line, with all the dangers and all the +inconveniences of its being a foreign line full before their eyes, <a name="Page_264" id="Page_264" title="264" class="pagenum"></a>and +operating with the utmost force upon their minds.</p> + +<p>A few years ago I should be ashamed to overload a matter so capable of +supporting itself by the then unnecessary support of any argument; but +this seditious, unconstitutional doctrine is now publicly taught, +avowed, and printed. The dislike I feel to revolutions, the signals for +which have so often been given from pulpits,—the spirit of change that +is gone abroad,—the total contempt which prevails with you, and may +come to prevail with us, of all ancient institutions, when set in +opposition to a present sense of convenience, or to the bent of a +present inclination,—all these considerations make it not unadvisable, +in my opinion, to call back our attention to the true principles of our +own domestic laws, that you, my French friend, should begin to know, and +that we should continue to cherish them. We ought not, on either side of +the water, to suffer ourselves to be imposed upon by the counterfeit +wares which some persons, by a double fraud, export to you in illicit +bottoms, as raw commodities of British growth, though wholly alien to +our soil, in order afterwards to smuggle them back again into this +country, manufactured after the newest Paris fashion of an improved +liberty.</p> + +<p>The people of England will not ape the fashions they have never tried, +nor go back to those which they have found mischievous on trial. They +look upon the legal hereditary succession of their crown as among their +rights, not as among their wrongs,—as a benefit, not as a +grievance,—as a security for their liberty, not as a badge of +servitude. They look on the frame of their commonwealth, <i>such as it +stands</i>, to be of inestimable value; and they conceive the <a name="Page_265" id="Page_265" title="265" class="pagenum"></a>undisturbed +succession of the crown to be a pledge of the stability and perpetuity +of all the other members of our Constitution.</p> + +<p>I shall beg leave, before I go any further, to take notice of some +paltry artifices which the abettors of election as the only lawful title +to the crown are ready to employ, in order to render the support of the +just principles of our Constitution a task somewhat invidious. These +sophisters substitute a fictitious cause, and feigned personages, in +whose favor they suppose you engaged, whenever you defend the +inheritable nature of the crown. It is common with them to dispute as if +they were in a conflict with some of those exploded fanatics of slavery +who formerly maintained, what I believe no creature now maintains, "that +the crown is held by divine, hereditary, and indefeasible right." These +old fanatics of single arbitrary power dogmatized as if hereditary +royalty was the only lawful government in the world,—just as our new +fanatics of popular arbitrary power maintain that a popular election is +the sole lawful source of authority. The old prerogative enthusiasts, it +is true, did speculate foolishly, and perhaps impiously too, as if +monarchy had more of a divine sanction than any other mode of +government,—and as if a right to govern by inheritance were in +strictness <i>indefeasible</i> in every person who should be found in the +succession to a throne, and under every circumstance, which no civil or +political right can be. But an absurd opinion concerning the king's +hereditary right to the crown does not prejudice one that is rational, +and bottomed upon solid principles of law and policy. If all the absurd +theories of lawyers and divines were to vitiate the objects in which +they are con<a name="Page_266" id="Page_266" title="266" class="pagenum"></a>versant, we should have no law and no religion left in the +world. But an absurd theory on one side of a question forms no +justification for alleging a false fact or promulgating mischievous +maxims on the other.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>The second claim of the Revolution Society is "a right of cashiering +their governors for <i>misconduct</i>." Perhaps the apprehensions our +ancestors entertained of forming such a precedent as that "of cashiering +for misconduct" was the cause that the declaration of the act which +implied the abdication of King James was, if it had any fault, rather +too guarded and too circumstantial.<a name="FNanchor_82_82" id="FNanchor_82_82"></a><a href="#Footnote_82_82" class="fnanchor" title=" "That King James the Second, having endeavored _to subvert +the Constitution_ of the kingdom, by breaking the _original contract_ +between king and people, and, by the advice of Jesuits and other wicked +persons, having violated the _fundamental_ laws, and _having withdrawn +himself out of the kingdom_, hath _abdicated_ the government, and the +throne is thereby _vacant_."">[82]</a> But all this guard, and all this +accumulation of circumstances, serves to show the spirit of caution +which predominated in the national councils, in a situation in which men +irritated by oppression, and elevated by a triumph over it, are apt to +abandon themselves to violent and extreme courses; it shows the anxiety +of the great men who influenced the conduct of affairs at that great +event to make the Revolution a parent of settlement, and not a nursery +of future revolutions.</p> + +<p>No government could stand a moment, if it could be blown down with +anything so loose and indefinite as an opinion of "<i>misconduct</i>." They +who led at the Revolution grounded their virtual abdication of King +James upon no such light and uncertain principle. They charged him with +nothing less than a design, confirmed by a multitude of illegal overt +acts, <a name="Page_267" id="Page_267" title="267" class="pagenum"></a>to <i>subvert the Protestant Church and State</i>, and their +<i>fundamental</i>, unquestionable laws and liberties: they charged him with +having broken the <i>original contrast</i> between king and people. This was +more than <i>misconduct</i>. A grave and overruling necessity obliged them to +take the step they took, and took with infinite reluctance, as under +that most rigorous of all laws. Their trust for the future preservation +of the Constitution was not in future revolutions. The grand policy of +all their regulations was to render it almost impracticable for any +future sovereign to compel the states of the kingdom to have again +recourse to those violent remedies. They left the crown, what in the eye +and estimation of law it had ever been, perfectly irresponsible. In +order to lighten the crown still further, they aggravated responsibility +on ministers of state. By the statute of the first of King William, +sess. 2d, called "<i>the act for declaring the rights and liberties of the +subject, and for settling the succession of the crown</i>," they enacted +that the ministers should serve the crown on the terms of that +declaration. They secured soon after the <i>frequent meetings of +Parliament</i>, by which the whole government would be under the constant +inspection and active control of the popular representative and of the +magnates of the kingdom. In the next great constitutional act, that of +the 12th and 13th of King William, for the further limitation of the +crown, and <i>better</i> securing the rights and liberties of the subject, +they provided "that no pardon under the great seal of England should be +pleadable to an impeachment by the Commons in Parliament." The rule laid +down for government in the Declaration of Right, the constant inspection +of Parliament, the practical claim of <a name="Page_268" id="Page_268" title="268" class="pagenum"></a>impeachment, they thought +infinitely a better security not only for their constitutional liberty, +but against the vices of administration, than the reservation of a right +so difficult in the practice, so uncertain in the issue, and often so +mischievous in the consequences, as that "cashiering their governors."</p> + +<p>Dr. Price, in this sermon,<a name="FNanchor_83_83" id="FNanchor_83_83"></a><a href="#Footnote_83_83" class="fnanchor" title=" P. 23, 23, 24.">[83]</a> condemns, very properly, the practice of +gross adulatory addresses to kings. Instead of this fulsome style, he +proposes that his Majesty should be told, on occasions of +congratulation, that "he is to consider himself as more properly the +servant than the sovereign of his people." For a compliment, this new +form of address does not seem to be very soothing. Those who are +servants in name, as well as in effect, do not like to be told of their +situation, their duty, and their obligations. The slave in the old play +tells his master, "<i>Hæc commemeratio est quasi exprobratio</i>." It is not +pleasant as compliment; it is not wholesome as instruction. After all, +if the king were to bring himself to echo this new kind of address, to +adopt it in terms, and even to take the appellation of Servant of the +People as his royal style, how either he or we should be much mended by +it I cannot imagine. I have seen very assuming letters signed, "Your +most obedient, humble servant." The proudest domination that ever was +endured on earth took a title of still greater humility than that which +is now proposed for sovereigns by the Apostle of Liberty. Kings and +nations were trampled upon by the foot of one calling himself "The +Servant of Servants"; and mandates for deposing sovereigns were sealed +with the signet of "The Fisherman."<a name="Page_269" id="Page_269" title="269" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>I should have considered all this as no more than a sort of flippant, +vain discourse, in which, as in an unsavory fume, several persons suffer +the spirit of liberty to evaporate, if it were not plainly in support of +the idea, and a part of the scheme, of "cashiering kings for +misconduct." In that light it is worth some observation.</p> + +<p>Kings, in one sense, are undoubtedly the servants of the people, because +their power has no other rational end than that of the general +advantage; but it is not true that they are, in the ordinary sense, (by +our Constitution, at least,) anything like servants,—the essence of +whose situation is to obey the commands of some other, and to be +removable at pleasure. But the king of Great Britain obeys no other +person; all other persons are individually, and collectively too, under +him, and owe to him a legal obedience. The law, which knows neither to +flatter nor to insult, calls this high-magistrate, not our servant, as +this humble divine calls him, but "<i>our sovereign lord the king</i>"; and +we, on our parts, have learned to speak only the primitive language of +the law, and not the confused jargon of their Babylonian pulpits.</p> + +<p>As he is not to obey us, but we are to obey the law in him, our +Constitution has made no sort of provision towards rendering him, as a +servant, in any degree responsible. Our Constitution knows nothing of a +magistrate like the <i>Justicia</i> of Aragon,—nor of any court legally +appointed, nor of any process legally settled, for submitting the king +to the responsibility belonging to all servants. In this he is not +distinguished from the commons and the lords, who, in their several +public capacities, can never be called to an account for their conduct; +although the Revo<a name="Page_270" id="Page_270" title="270" class="pagenum"></a>lution Society chooses to assert, in direct opposition +to one of the wisest and most beautiful parts of our Constitution, that +"a king is no more than the first servant of the public, created by it, +<i>and responsible to it</i>."</p> + +<p>Ill would our ancestors at the Revolution have deserved their fame for +wisdom, if they had found no security for their freedom, but in +rendering their government feeble in its operations and precarious in +its tenure,—if they had been able to contrive no better remedy against +arbitrary power than civil confusion. Let these gentlemen state who that +<i>representative</i> public is to whom they will affirm the king, as a +servant, to be responsible. It will be then time enough for me to +produce to them the positive statute law which affirms that he is not.</p> + +<p>The ceremony of cashiering kings, of which these gentlemen talk so much +at their ease, can rarely, if ever, be performed without force. It then +becomes a case of war, and not of constitution. Laws are commanded to +hold their tongues amongst arms; and tribunals fall to the ground with +the peace they are no longer able to uphold. The Revolution of 1688 was +obtained by a just war, in the only case in which any war, and much more +a civil war, can be just. "<i>Justa bella quibus</i> NECESSARIA." The +question of dethroning, or, if these gentlemen, like the phrase better, +"cashiering kings," will always be, as it has always been, an +extraordinary question of state, and wholly out of the law: a question +(like all other questions of state) of dispositions, and of means, and +of probable consequences, rather than of positive rights. As it was not +made for common abuses, so it is not to be agitated by common minds. The +speculative line of demarcation, where obedience ought to end and +re<a name="Page_271" id="Page_271" title="271" class="pagenum"></a>sistance must begin, is faint, obscure, and not easily definable. It +is not a single act or a single event which determines it. Governments +must be abused and deranged indeed, before it can be thought of; and the +prospect of the future must be as bad as the experience of the past. +When things are in that lamentable condition, the nature of the disease +is to indicate the remedy to those whom Nature has qualified to +administer in extremities this critical, ambiguous, bitter potion to a +distempered state. Times and occasions and provocations will teach their +own lessons. The wise will determine from the gravity of the case; the +irritable, from sensibility to oppression; the high-minded, from disdain +and indignation at abusive power in unworthy hands; the brave and bold, +from the love of honorable danger in a generous cause: but, with or +without right, a revolution will be the very last resource of the +thinking and the good.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>The third head of right asserted by the pulpit of the Old Jewry, namely, +the "right to form a government for ourselves," has, at least, as little +countenance from anything done at the Revolution, either in precedent or +principle, as the two first of their claims. The Revolution was made to +preserve our <i>ancient</i> indisputable laws and liberties, and that +<i>ancient</i> constitution of government which is our only security for law +and liberty. If you are desirous of knowing the spirit of our +Constitution, and the policy which predominated in that great period +which has secured it to this hour, pray look for both in our histories, +in our records, in our acts of Parliament and journals of Parliament, +and not in the sermons of the Old Jewry, and the after-dinner toasts of +the Revolu<a name="Page_272" id="Page_272" title="272" class="pagenum"></a>tion Society. In the former you will find other ideas and +another language. Such a claim is as ill-suited to our temper and wishes +as it is unsupported by any appearance of authority. The very idea of +the fabrication of a new government is enough to fill us with disgust +and horror. We wished at the period of the Revolution, and do now wish, +to derive all we possess as <i>an inheritance from our forefathers</i>. Upon +that body and stock of inheritance we have taken care not to inoculate +any scion alien to the nature of the original plant. All the +reformations we have hitherto made have proceeded upon the principle of +reference to antiquity; and I hope, nay, I am persuaded, that all those +which possibly may be made hereafter will be carefully formed upon +analogical precedent, authority, and example.</p> + +<p>Our oldest reformation is that of Magna Charta. You will see that Sir +Edward Coke, that great oracle of our law, and indeed all the great men +who follow him, to Blackstone,<a name="FNanchor_84_84" id="FNanchor_84_84"></a><a href="#Footnote_84_84" class="fnanchor" title=" See Blackstone's Magna Charta, printed at Oxford, 1759.">[84]</a> are industrious to prove the pedigree +of our liberties. They endeavor to prove that the ancient charter, the +Magna Charta of King John, was connected with another positive charter +from Henry the First, and that both the one and the other were nothing +more than a reaffirmance of the still more ancient standing law of the +kingdom. In the matter of fact, for the greater part, these authors +appear to be in the right; perhaps not always: but if the lawyers +mistake in some particulars, it proves my position still the more +strongly; because it demonstrates the powerful prepossession towards +antiquity with which the minds of all our lawyers and legislators, and +of all the people whom they wish to <a name="Page_273" id="Page_273" title="273" class="pagenum"></a>influence, have been always filled, +and the stationary policy of this kingdom in considering their most +sacred rights and franchises as an <i>inheritance</i>.</p> + +<p>In the famous law of the 3rd of Charles the First, called the <i>Petition +of Right,</i> the Parliament says to the king, "Your subjects have +<i>inherited</i> this freedom": claiming their franchises, not on abstract +principles, "as the rights of men," but as the rights of Englishmen, and +as a patrimony derived from their forefathers. Selden, and the other +profoundly learned men who drew this Petition of Right, were as well +acquainted, at least, with all the general theories concerning the +"rights of men" as any of the discoursers in our pulpits or on your +tribune: full as well as Dr. Price, or as the Abbé Sièyes. But, for +reasons worthy of that practical wisdom which superseded their theoretic +science, they preferred this positive, recorded, <i>hereditary</i> title to +all which can be dear to the man and the citizen to that vague, +speculative right which exposed their sure inheritance to be scrambled +for and torn to pieces by every wild, litigious spirit.</p> + +<p>The same policy pervades all the laws which have since been made for the +preservation of our liberties. In the 1st of William and Mary, in the +famous statute called the Declaration of Right, the two Houses utter not +a syllable of "a right to frame a government for themselves." You will +see that their whole care was to secure the religion, laws, and +liberties that had been long possessed, and had been lately endangered. +"Taking<a name="FNanchor_85_85" id="FNanchor_85_85"></a><a href="#Footnote_85_85" class="fnanchor" title=" 1 W. and M.">[85]</a> into their most serious consideration the <i>best</i> means for +making such an establishment that their religion, laws, and liberties +might <a name="Page_274" id="Page_274" title="274" class="pagenum"></a>not be in danger of being again subverted," they auspicate all +their proceedings by stating as some of those <i>best</i> means, "in the +<i>first place</i>," to do "as their <i>ancestors in like cases have usually</i> +done for vindicating their <i>ancient</i> rights and liberties, to +<i>declare</i>";—and then they pray the king and queen "that it may be +<i>declared</i> and enacted that <i>all and singular</i> the rights and liberties +<i>asserted and declared</i> are the true <i>ancient</i> and indubitable rights +and liberties of the people of this kingdom."</p> + +<p>You will observe, that, from Magna Charta to the Declaration of Right, +it has been the uniform policy of our Constitution to claim and assert +our liberties as an <i>entailed inheritance</i> derived to us from our +forefathers, and to be transmitted to our posterity,—as an estate +specially belonging to the people of this kingdom, without any reference +whatever to any other more general or prior right. By this means our +Constitution preserves an unity in so great a diversity of its parts. We +have an inheritable crown, an inheritable peerage, and a House of +Commons and a people inheriting privileges, franchises, and liberties +from a long line of ancestors.</p> + +<p>This policy appears to me to be the result of profound reflection,—or +rather the happy effect of following Nature, which is wisdom without +reflection, and above it. A spirit of innovation is generally the result +of a selfish temper and confined views. People will not look forward to +posterity, who never look backward to their ancestors. Besides, the +people of England well know that the idea of inheritance furnishes a +sure principle of conservation, and a sure principle of transmission, +without at all excluding a principle of improvement. It leaves +acquisition free; <a name="Page_275" id="Page_275" title="275" class="pagenum"></a>but it secures what it acquires. Whatever advantages +are obtained by a state proceeding on these maxims are locked fast as in +a sort of family settlement, grasped as in a kind of mortmain forever. +By a constitutional policy working after the pattern of Nature, we +receive, we hold, we transmit our government and our privileges, in the +same manner in which we enjoy and transmit our property and our lives. +The institutions of policy, the goods of fortune, the gifts of +Providence, are handed down to us, and from us, in the same course and +order. Our political system is placed in a just correspondence and +symmetry with the order of the world, and with the mode of existence +decreed to a permanent body composed of transitory parts,—wherein, by +the disposition of a stupendous wisdom, moulding together the great +mysterious incorporation of the human race, the whole, at one time, is +never old or middle-aged or young, but, in a condition of unchangeable +constancy, moves on through the varied tenor of perpetual decay, fall, +renovation, and progression. Thus, by preserving the method of Nature in +the conduct of the state, in what we improve we are never wholly new, in +what we retain we are never wholly obsolete. By adhering in this manner +and on those principles to our forefathers, we are guided, not by the +superstition of antiquarians, but by the spirit of philosophic analogy. +In this choice of inheritance we have given to our frame of polity the +image of a relation in blood: binding up the Constitution of our country +with our dearest domestic ties; adopting our fundamental laws into the +bosom of our family affections; keeping inseparable, and cherishing with +the warmth of all their combined and mutually reflected charities, our +state, our hearths, our sepulchres, and our altars.<a name="Page_276" id="Page_276" title="276" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>Through the same plan of a conformity to Nature in our artificial +institutions, and by calling in the aid of her unerring and powerful +instincts to fortify the fallible and feeble contrivances of our reason, +we have derived several other, and those no small benefits, from +considering our liberties in the light of an inheritance. Always acting +as if in the presence of canonized forefathers, the spirit of freedom, +leading in itself to misrule and excess, is tempered with an awful +gravity. This idea of a liberal descent inspires us with a sense of +habitual native dignity, which prevents that upstart insolence almost +inevitably adhering to and disgracing those who are the first acquirers +of any distinction. By this means our liberty becomes a noble freedom. +It carries an imposing and majestic aspect. It has a pedigree and +illustrating ancestors. It has its bearings and its ensigns armorial. It +has its gallery of portraits, its monumental inscriptions, its records, +evidences, and titles. We procure reverence to our civil institutions on +the principle upon which Nature teaches us to revere individual men: on +account of their age, and on account of those from whom they are +descended. All your sophisters cannot produce anything better adapted to +preserve a rational and manly freedom than the course that we have +pursued, who have chosen our nature rather than our speculations, our +breasts rather than our inventions, for the great conservatories and +magazines of our rights and privileges.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>You might, if you pleased, have profited of our example, and have given +to your recovered freedom a correspondent dignity. Your privileges, +though discontinued, were not lost to memory. Your Consti<a name="Page_277" id="Page_277" title="277" class="pagenum"></a>tution, it is +true, whilst you were out of possession, suffered waste and +dilapidation; but you possessed in some parts the walls, and in all the +foundations, of a noble and venerable castle. You might have repaired +those walls; you might have built on those old foundations. Your +Constitution was suspended before it was perfected; but you had the +elements of a Constitution very nearly as good as could be wished. In +your old states you possessed that variety of parts corresponding with +the various descriptions of which your community was happily composed; +you had all that combination and all that opposition of interests, you +had that action and counteraction, which, in the natural and in the +political world, from the reciprocal struggle of discordant powers draws +out the harmony of the universe. These opposed and conflicting +interests, which you considered as so great a blemish in your old and in +our present Constitution, interpose a salutary check to all precipitate +resolutions. They render deliberation a matter, not of choice, but of +necessity; they make all change a subject of <i>compromise</i>, which +naturally begets moderation; they produce <i>temperaments</i>, preventing the +sore evil of harsh, crude, unqualified reformations, and rendering all +the headlong exertions of arbitrary power, in the few or in the many, +forever impracticable. Through that diversity of members and interests, +general liberty had as many securities as there were separate views in +the several orders; whilst by pressing down the whole by the weight of a +real monarchy, the separate parts would have been prevented from warping +and starting from their allotted places.</p> + +<p>You had all these advantages in your ancient states; but you chose to +act as if you had never <a name="Page_278" id="Page_278" title="278" class="pagenum"></a>been moulded into civil society, and had +everything to begin anew. You began ill, because you began by despising +everything that belonged to you. You set up your trade without a +capital. If the last generations of your country appeared without much +lustre in your eyes, you might have passed them by, and derived your +claims from a more early race of ancestors. Under a pious predilection +for those ancestors, your imaginations would have realized in them a +standard of virtue and wisdom beyond the vulgar practice of the hour; +and you would have risen with the example to whose imitation you +aspired. Respecting your forefathers, you would have been taught to +respect yourselves. You would not have chosen to consider the French as +a people of yesterday, as a nation of low-born, servile wretches until +the emancipating year of 1789. In order to furnish, at the expense of +your honor, an excuse to your apologists here for several enormities of +yours, you would not have been content to be represented as a gang of +Maroon slaves, suddenly broke loose from the house of bondage, and +therefore to be pardoned for your abuse of the liberty to which you were +not accustomed, and were ill fitted. Would it not, my worthy friend, +have been wiser to have you thought, what I for one always thought you, +a generous and gallant nation, long misled to your disadvantage by your +high and romantic sentiments of fidelity, honor, and loyalty; that +events had been unfavorable to you, but that you were not enslaved +through any illiberal or servile disposition; that, in your most devoted +submission, you were actuated by a principle of public spirit; and that +it was your country you worshipped, in the person of your king? Had you +made it to be under<a name="Page_279" id="Page_279" title="279" class="pagenum"></a>stood, that, in the delusion of this amiable error, +you had gone further than your wise ancestors,—that you were resolved +to resume your ancient privileges, whilst you preserved the spirit of +your ancient and your recent loyalty and honor; or if, diffident of +yourselves, and not clearly discerning the almost obliterated +Constitution of your ancestors, you had looked to your neighbors in this +land, who had kept alive the ancient principles and models of the old +common law of Europe, meliorated and adapted to its present state,—by +following wise examples you would have given new examples of wisdom to +the world. You would have rendered the cause of liberty venerable in the +eyes of every worthy mind in every nation. You would have shamed +despotism from the earth, by showing that freedom was not only +reconcilable, but, as, when well disciplined, it is, auxiliary to law. +You would have had an unoppressive, but a productive revenue. You would +have had a flourishing commerce to feed it. You would have had a free +Constitution, a potent monarchy, a disciplined army, a reformed and +venerated clergy,—a mitigated, but spirited nobility, to lead your +virtue, not to overlay it; you would have had a liberal order of +commons, to emulate and to recruit that nobility; you would have had a +protected, satisfied, laborious, and obedient people, taught to seek and +to recognize the happiness that is to be found by virtue in all +conditions,—in which consists the true moral equality of mankind, and +not in that monstrous fiction which, by inspiring false ideas and vain +expectations into men destined to travel in the obscure walk of +laborious life, serves only to aggravate and embitter that real +inequality which it never can remove, and which the order of civil life +establishes as much for <a name="Page_280" id="Page_280" title="280" class="pagenum"></a>the benefit of those whom it must leave in an +humble state as those whom it is able to exalt to a condition more +splendid, but not more happy. You had a smooth and easy career of +felicity and glory laid open to you, beyond anything recorded in the +history of the world; but you have shown that difficulty is good for +man.</p> + +<p>Compute your gains; see what is got by those extravagant and +presumptuous speculations which have taught your leaders to despise all +their predecessors, and all their contemporaries, and even to despise +themselves, until the moment in which they became truly despicable. By +following those false lights, France has bought undisguised calamities +at a higher price than any nation has purchased the most unequivocal +blessings. France has bought poverty by crime. France has not sacrificed +her virtue to her interest; but she has abandoned her interest, that she +might prostitute her virtue. All other nations have begun the fabric of +a new government, or the reformation of an old, by establishing +originally, or by enforcing with greater exactness, some rites or other +of religion. All other people have laid the foundations of civil freedom +in severer manners, and a system of a more austere and masculine +morality. France, when she let loose the reins of regal authority, +doubled the license of a ferocious dissoluteness in manners, and of an +insolent irreligion in opinions and practices,—and has extended through +all ranks of life, as if she were communicating some privilege, or +laying open some secluded benefit, all the unhappy corruptions that +usually were the disease of wealth and power. This is one of the new +principles of equality in France.<a name="Page_281" id="Page_281" title="281" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>France, by the perfidy of her leaders, has utterly disgraced the tone of +lenient council in the cabinets of princes, and disarmed it of its most +potent topics. She has sanctified the dark, suspicious maxims of +tyrannous distrust, and taught kings to tremble at (what will hereafter +be called) the delusive plausibilities of moral politicians. Sovereigns +will consider those who advise them to place an unlimited confidence in +their people as subverters of their thrones,—as traitors who aim at +their destruction, by leading their easy good-nature, under specious +pretences, to admit combinations of bold and faithless men into a +participation of their power. This alone (if there were nothing else) is +an irreparable calamity to you and to mankind. Remember that your +Parliament of Paris told your king, that, in calling the states +together, he had nothing to fear but the prodigal excess of their zeal +in providing for the support of the throne. It is right that these men +should hide their heads. It is right that they should bear their part in +the ruin which their counsel has brought on their sovereign and their +country. Such sanguine declarations tend to lull authority asleep,—to +encourage it rashly to engage in perilous adventures of untried +policy,—to neglect those provisions, preparations, and precautions +which distinguish benevolence from imbecility, and without which no man +can answer for the salutary effect of any abstract plan of government or +of freedom. For want of these, they have seen the medicine of the state +corrupted into its poison. They have seen the French rebel against a +mild and lawful monarch, with more fury, outrage, and insult than ever +any people has been known to rise against the most illegal usurper or +the most sanguinary ty<a name="Page_282" id="Page_282" title="282" class="pagenum"></a>rant. Their resistance was made to concession; +their revolt was from protection; their blow was aimed at a hand holding +out graces, favors, and immunities.</p> + +<p>This was unnatural. The rest is in order. They have found their +punishment in their success. Laws overturned; tribunals subverted; +industry without vigor; commerce expiring; the revenue unpaid, yet the +people impoverished; a church pillaged, and a state not relieved; civil +and military anarchy made the constitution of the kingdom; everything +human and divine sacrificed to the idol of public credit, and national +bankruptcy the consequence; and, to crown all, the paper securities of +new, precarious, tottering power, the discredited paper securities of +impoverished fraud and beggared rapine, held out as a currency for the +support of an empire, in lieu of the two great recognized species that +represent the lasting, conventional credit of mankind, which disappeared +and hid themselves in the earth from whence they came, when the +principle of property, whose creatures and representatives they are, was +systematically subverted.</p> + +<p>Were all these dreadful things necessary? Were they the inevitable +results of the desperate struggle of determined patriots, compelled to +wade through blood and tumult to the quiet shore of a tranquil and +prosperous liberty? No! nothing like it. The fresh ruins of France, +which shock our feelings wherever we can turn our eyes, are not the +devastation of civil war: they are the sad, but instructive monuments of +rash and ignorant counsel in time of profound peace. They are the +display of inconsiderate and presumptuous, because unresisted and +irresistible authority. The persons who have thus squandered <a name="Page_283" id="Page_283" title="283" class="pagenum"></a>away the +precious treasure of their crimes, the persons who have made this +prodigal and wild waste of public evils, (the last stake reserved for +the ultimate ransom of the state,) have met in their progress with +little, or rather with no opposition at all. Their whole march was more +like a triumphal procession than the progress of a war. Their pioneers +have gone before them, and demolished and laid everything level at their +feet. Not one drop of <i>their</i> blood have they shed in the cause of the +country they have ruined. They have made no sacrifices to their projects +of greater consequence than their shoe-buckles, whilst they were +imprisoning their king, murdering their fellow-citizens, and bathing in +tears and plunging in poverty and distress thousands of worthy men and +worthy families. Their cruelty has not even been the base result of +fear. It has been the effect of their sense of perfect safety, in +authorizing treasons, robberies, rapes, assassinations, slaughters, and +burnings, throughout their harassed land. But the cause of all was plain +from the beginning.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>This unforced choice, this fond election of evil, would appear perfectly +unaccountable, if we did not consider the composition of the National +Assembly: I do not mean its formal constitution, which, as it now +stands, is exceptionable enough, but the materials of which in a great +measure it is composed, which is of ten thousand times greater +consequence than all the formalities in the world. If we were to know +nothing of this assembly but by its title and function, no colors could +paint to the imagination anything more venerable. In that light, the +mind of an inquirer, subdued by such an awful image as that <a name="Page_284" id="Page_284" title="284" class="pagenum"></a>of the +virtue and wisdom of a whole people collected into one focus, would +pause and hesitate in condemning things even of the very worst aspect. +Instead of blamable, they would appear only mysterious. But no name, no +power, no function, no artificial institution whatsoever, can make the +men, of whom any system of authority is composed, any other than God, +and Nature, and education, and their habits of life have made them. +Capacities beyond these the people have not to give. Virtue and wisdom +may be the objects of their choice; but their choice confers neither the +one nor the other on those upon whom they lay their ordaining hands. +They have not the engagement of Nature, they have not the promise of +Revelation for any such powers.</p> + +<p>After I had read over the list of the persons and descriptions elected +into the <i>Tiers État</i>, nothing which they afterwards did could appear +astonishing. Among them, indeed, I saw some of known rank, some of +shining talents; but of any practical experience in the state not one +man was to be found. The best were only men of theory. But whatever the +distinguished few may have been, it is the substance and mass of the +body which constitutes its character, and must finally determine its +direction. In all bodies, those who will lead must also, in a +considerable degree, follow. They must conform their propositions to the +taste, talent, and disposition of those whom they wish to conduct: +therefore, if an assembly is viciously or feebly composed in a very +great part of it, nothing but such a supreme degree of virtue as very +rarely appears in the world, and for that reason cannot enter into +calculation, will prevent the men of talents disseminated through it +from <a name="Page_285" id="Page_285" title="285" class="pagenum"></a>becoming only the expert instruments of absurd projects. If, what +is the more likely event, instead of that unusual degree of virtue, they +should be actuated by sinister ambition and a lust of meretricious +glory, then the feeble part of the assembly, to whom at first they +conform, becomes, in its turn, the dupe and instrument of their designs. +In this political traffic, the leaders will be obliged to bow to the +ignorance of their followers, and the followers to become subservient to +the worst designs of their leaders.</p> + +<p>To secure any degree of sobriety in the propositions made by the leaders +in any public assembly, they ought to respect, in some degree perhaps to +fear, those whom they conduct. To be led any otherwise than blindly, the +followers must be qualified, if not for actors, at least for judges; +they must also be judges of natural weight and authority. Nothing can +secure a steady and moderate conduct in such assemblies, but that the +body of them should be respectably composed, in point of condition in +life, of permanent property, of education, and of such habits as enlarge +and liberalize the understanding.</p> + +<p>In the calling of the States-General of France, the first thing that +struck me was a great departure from the ancient course. I found the +representation for the third estate composed of six hundred persons. +They were equal in number to the representatives of both the other +orders. If the orders were to act separately, the number would not, +beyond the consideration of the expense, be of much moment. But when it +became apparent that the three orders were to be melted down into one, +the policy and necessary effect of this numerous representation became +obvious. A very small desertion from either of the <a name="Page_286" id="Page_286" title="286" class="pagenum"></a>other two orders +must throw the power of both into the hands of the third. In fact, the +whole power of the state was soon resolved into that body. Its due +composition became, therefore, of infinitely the greater importance.</p> + +<p>Judge, Sir, of my surprise, when I found that a very great proportion of +the Assembly (a majority, I believe, of the members who attended) was +composed of practitioners in the law. It was composed, not of +distinguished magistrates, who had given pledges to their country of +their science, prudence, and integrity,—not of leading advocates, the +glory of the bar,—not of renowned professors in universities,—but for +the far greater part, as it must in such a number, of the inferior, +unlearned, mechanical, merely instrumental members of the profession. +There were distinguished exceptions; but the general composition was of +obscure provincial advocates, of stewards of petty local jurisdictions, +country attorneys, notaries, and the whole train of the ministers of +municipal litigation, the fomenters and conductors of the petty war of +village vexation. From the moment I read the list, I saw distinctly, and +very nearly as it has happened, all that was to follow.</p> + +<p>The degree of estimation in which any profession is held becomes the +standard of the estimation in which the professors hold themselves. +Whatever the personal merits of many individual lawyers might have been, +(and in many it was undoubtedly very considerable,) in that military +kingdom no part of the profession had been much regarded, except the +highest of all, who often united to their professional offices great +family splendor, and were invested with great power and authority. These +certainly were highly <a name="Page_287" id="Page_287" title="287" class="pagenum"></a>respected, and even with no small degree of awe. +The next rank was not much esteemed; the mechanical part was in a very +low degree of repute.</p> + +<p>Whenever the supreme authority is vested in a body so composed, it must +evidently produce the consequences of supreme authority placed in the +hands of men not taught habitually to respect themselves,—who had no +previous fortune in character at stake,—who could not be expected to +bear with moderation or to conduct with discretion a power which they +themselves, more than any others, must be surprised to find in their +hands. Who could flatter himself that these men, suddenly, and as it +were by enchantment, snatched from the humblest rank of subordination, +would not be intoxicated with their unprepared greatness? Who could +conceive that men who are habitually meddling, daring, subtle, active, +of litigious dispositions and unquiet minds, would easily fall back into +their old condition of obscure contention, and laborious, low, and +unprofitable chicane? Who could doubt but that, at any expense to the +state, of which they understood nothing, they must pursue their private +interests, which they understood but too well? It was not an event +depending on chance or contingency. It was inevitable; it was necessary; +it was planted in the nature of things. They must <i>join</i> (if their +capacity did not permit them to <i>lead</i>) in any project which could +procure to them a <i>litigious constitution</i>,—which could lay open to +them those innumerable lucrative jobs which follow in the train of all +great convulsions and revolutions in the state, and particularly in all +great and violent permutations of property. Was it to be expected that +they would attend to the stability of property, whose <a name="Page_288" id="Page_288" title="288" class="pagenum"></a>existence had +always depended upon whatever rendered property questionable, ambiguous, +and insecure? Their objects would be enlarged with their elevation; but +their disposition, and habits, and mode of accomplishing their designs +must remain the same.</p> + +<p>Well! but these men were to be tempered and restrained by other +descriptions, of more sober minds and more enlarged understandings. Were +they, then, to be awed by the supereminent authority and awful dignity +of a handful of country clowns, who have seats in that assembly, some of +whom are said not to be able to read and write,—and by not a greater +number of traders, who, though somewhat more instructed, and more +conspicuous in the order of society, had never known anything beyond +their counting-house? No! both these descriptions were more formed to be +overborne and swayed by the intrigues and artifices of lawyers than to +become their counterpoise. With such a dangerous disproportion, the +whole must needs be governed by them.</p> + +<p>To the faculty of law was joined a pretty considerable proportion of the +faculty of medicine. This faculty had not, any more than that of the +law, possessed in France its just estimation. Its professors, therefore, +must have the qualities of men not habituated to sentiments of dignity. +But supposing they had ranked as they ought to do, and as with us they +do actually, the sides of sick-beds are not the academies for forming +statesmen and legislators. Then came the dealers in stocks and funds, +who must be eager, at any expense, to change their ideal paper wealth +for the more solid substance of land. To these were joined men of other +descriptions, from <a name="Page_289" id="Page_289" title="289" class="pagenum"></a>whom as little knowledge of or attention to the +interests of a great state was to be expected, and as little regard to +the stability of any institution,—men formed to be instruments, not +controls.—Such, in general, was the composition of the <i>Tiers État</i> in +the National Assembly; in which was scarcely to be perceived the +slightest traces of what we call the natural landed interest of the +country.</p> + +<p>We know that the British House of Commons, without shutting its doors to +any merit in any class, is, by the sure operation of adequate causes, +filled with everything illustrious in rank, in descent, in hereditary +and in acquired opulence, in cultivated talents, in military, civil, +naval, and politic distinction, that the country can afford. But +supposing, what hardly can be supposed as a case, that the House of +Commons should be composed in the same manner with the <i>Tiers État</i> in +France,—would this dominion of chicane be borne with patience, or even +conceived without horror? God forbid I should insinuate anything +derogatory to that profession which is another priesthood, administering +the rights of sacred justice! But whilst I revere men in the functions +which belong to them, and would do as much as one man can do to prevent +their exclusion from any, I cannot, to flatter them, give the lie to +Nature. They are good and useful in the composition; they must be +mischievous, if they preponderate so as virtually to become the whole. +Their very excellence in their peculiar functions may be far from a +qualification for others. It cannot escape observation, that, when men +are too much confined to professional and faculty habits, and, as it +were, inveterate in the recurrent employment of that narrow circle, they +are <a name="Page_290" id="Page_290" title="290" class="pagenum"></a>rather disabled than qualified for whatever depends on the +knowledge of mankind, on experience in mixed affairs, on a +comprehensive, connected view of the various, complicated, external, and +internal interests which go to the formation of that multifarious thing +called a State.</p> + +<p>After all, if the House of Commons were to have an wholly professional +and faculty composition, what is the power of the House of Commons, +circumscribed and shut in by the immovable barriers of laws, usages, +positive rules of doctrine and practice, counterpoised by the House of +Lords, and every moment of its existence at the discretion of the crown +to continue, prorogue, or dissolve us? The power of the House of +Commons, direct or indirect, is, indeed, great: and long may it be able +to preserve its greatness, and the spirit belonging to true greatness, +at the full!—and it will do so, as long as it can keep the breakers of +law in India from becoming the makers of law for England. The power, +however, of the House of Commons, when least diminished, is as a drop of +water in the ocean, compared to that residing in a settled majority of +your National Assembly. That assembly, since the destruction of the +orders, has no fundamental law, no strict convention, no respected usage +to restrain it. Instead of finding themselves obliged to conform to a +fixed constitution, they have a power to make a constitution which shall +conform to their designs. Nothing in heaven or upon earth can serve as a +control on them. What ought to be the heads, the hearts, the +dispositions, that are qualified, or that dare, not only to make laws +under a fixed constitution, but at one heat to strike out a totally new +constitution for a great kingdom, and in every part <a name="Page_291" id="Page_291" title="291" class="pagenum"></a>of it, from the +monarch on the throne to the vestry of a parish? But</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Fools rush in where angels fear to tread."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="noindent">In such a state of unbounded power, for undefined and undefinable +purposes, the evil of a moral and almost physical inaptitude of the man +to the function must be the greatest we can conceive to happen in the +management of human affairs.</p> + +<p>Having considered the composition of the third estate, as it stood in +its original frame, I took a view of the representatives of the clergy. +There, too, it appeared that full as little regard was had to the +general security of property, or to the aptitude of the deputies for +their public purposes, in the principles of their election. That +election was so contrived as to send a very large proportion of mere +country curates to the great and arduous work of new-modelling a state: +men who never had seen the state so much as in a picture; men who knew +nothing of the world beyond the bounds of an obscure village; who, +immersed in hopeless poverty, could regard all property, whether secular +or ecclesiastical, with no other eye than that of envy; among whom must +be many who, for the smallest hope of the meanest dividend in plunder, +would readily join in any attempts upon a body of wealth in which they +could hardly look to have any share, except in a general scramble. +Instead of balancing the power of the active chicaners in the other +assembly, these curates must necessarily become the active coadjutors, +or at best the passive instruments, of those by whom they had been +habitually guided in their petty village concerns. They, too, could +hardly be the most conscientious of their kind, who, presuming upon +their incompetent understand<a name="Page_292" id="Page_292" title="292" class="pagenum"></a>ing, could intrigue for a trust which led +them from their natural relation to their flocks, and their natural +spheres of action, to undertake the regeneration of kingdoms. This +preponderating weight, being added to the force of the body of chicane +in the <i>Tiers État</i>, completed that momentum of ignorance, rashness, +presumption, and lust of plunder, which nothing has been able to resist.</p> + +<p>To observing men it must have appeared from the beginning, that the +majority of the third estate, in conjunction with such a deputation from +the clergy as I have described, whilst it pursued the destruction of the +nobility, would inevitably become subservient to the worst designs of +individuals in that class. In the spoil and humiliation of their own +order these individuals would possess a sure fund for the pay of their +new followers. To squander away the objects which made the happiness of +their fellows would be to them no sacrifice at all. Turbulent, +discontented men of quality, in proportion as they are puffed up with +personal pride and arrogance, generally despise their own order. One of +the first symptoms they discover of a selfish and mischievous ambition +is a profligate disregard of a dignity which they partake with others. +To be attached to the subdivision, to love the little platoon we belong +to in society, is the first principle (the germ, as it were) of public +affections. It is the first link in the series by which we proceed +towards a love to our country and to mankind. The interest of that +portion of social arrangement is a trust in the hands of all those who +compose it; and as none but bad men would justify it in abuse, none but +traitors would barter it away for their own personal advantage.<a name="Page_293" id="Page_293" title="293" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>There were, in the time of our civil troubles in England, (I do not know +whether you have any such in your Assembly in France,) several persons, +like the then Earl of Holland, who by themselves or their families had +brought an odium on the throne by the prodigal dispensation of its +bounties towards them, who afterwards joined in the rebellions arising +from the discontents of which they were themselves the cause: men who +helped to subvert that throne to which they owed, some of them, their +existence, others all that power which they employed to ruin their +benefactor. If any bounds are set to the rapacious demands of that sort +of people, or that others are permitted to partake in the objects they +would engross, revenge and envy soon fill up the craving void that is +left in their avarice. Confounded by the complication of distempered +passions, their reason is disturbed; their views become vast and +perplexed,—to others inexplicable, to themselves uncertain. They find, +on all sides, bounds to their unprincipled ambition in any fixed order +of things; but in the fog and haze of confusion all is enlarged, and +appears without any limit.</p> + +<p>When men of rank sacrifice all ideas of dignity to an ambition without a +distinct object, and work with low instruments and for low ends, the +whole composition becomes low and base. Does not something like this now +appear in France? Does it not produce something ignoble and inglorious: +a kind of meanness in all the prevalent policy; a tendency in all that +is done to lower along with individuals all the dignity and importance +of the state? Other revolutions have been conducted by persons who, +whilst they attempted or affected changes in the commonwealth, +<a name="Page_294" id="Page_294" title="294" class="pagenum"></a>sanctified their ambition by advancing the dignity of the people whose +peace they troubled. They had long views. They aimed at the rule, not at +the destruction of their country. They were men of great civil and great +military talents, and if the terror, the ornament of their age. They +were not like Jew brokers contending with each other who could best +remedy with fraudulent circulation and depreciated paper the +wretchedness and ruin brought on their country by their degenerate +councils. The compliment made to one of the great bad men of the old +stamp (Cromwell) by his kinsman, a favorite poet of that time, shows +what it was he proposed, and what indeed to a great degree he +accomplished in the success of his ambition:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span style="margin-left: -.5em;">"Still as <i>you</i> rise, the <i>state</i>, exalted too,<br /></span> +<span>Finds no distemper whilst 't is changed by <i>you</i>;<br /></span> +<span>Changed like the world's great scene, when without noise<br /></span> +<span>The rising sun night's <i>vulgar</i> lights destroys."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>These disturbers were not so much like men usurping power as asserting +their natural place in society. Their rising was to illuminate and +beautify the world. Their conquest over their competitors was by +outshining them. The hand, that, like a destroying angel, smote the +country, communicated to it the force and energy under which it +suffered. I do not say, (God forbid!) I do not say that the virtues of +such men were to be taken as a balance to their crimes; but they were +some corrective to their effects. Such was, as I said, our Cromwell. +Such were your whole race of Guises, Condés, and Colignys. Such the +Richelieus, who in more quiet times acted in the spirit of a civil war. +Such, as better men, and in a less dubious cause, were your Henry the +Fourth, and your<a name="Page_295" id="Page_295" title="295" class="pagenum"></a> Sully, though nursed in civil confusions, and not +wholly without some of their taint. It is a thing to be wondered at, to +see how very soon France, when she had a moment to respire, recovered +and emerged from the longest and most dreadful civil war that ever was +known in any nation. Why? Because, among all their massacres, they had +not slain the <i>mind</i> in their country. A conscious dignity, a noble +pride, a generous sense of glory and emulation, was not extinguished. On +the contrary, it was kindled and inflamed. The organs also of the state, +however shattered, existed. All the prizes of honor and virtue, all the +rewards, all the distinctions, remained. But your present confusion, +like a palsy, has attacked the fountain of life itself. Every person in +your country, in a situation to be actuated by a principle of honor, is +disgraced and degraded, and can entertain no sensation of life, except +in a mortified and humiliated indignation. But this generation will +quickly pass away. The next generation of the nobility will resemble the +artificers and clowns, and money-jobbers, usurers, and Jews, who will be +always their fellows, sometimes their masters. Believe me, Sir, those +who attempt to level never equalize. In all societies consisting of +various descriptions of citizens, some description must be uppermost. +The levellers, therefore, only change and pervert the natural order of +things: they load the edifice of society by setting up in the air what +the solidity of the structure requires to be on the ground. The +associations of tailors and carpenters, of which the republic (of Paris, +for instance) is composed, cannot be equal to the situation into which, +by the worst of usurpations, an usurpation on the prerogatives of +Nature, you attempt to force them.<a name="Page_296" id="Page_296" title="296" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>The Chancellor of France, at the opening of the States, said, in a tone +of oratorial flourish, that all occupations were honorable. If he meant +only that no honest employment was disgraceful, he would not have gone +beyond the truth. But in asserting that anything is honorable, we imply +some distinction in its favor. The occupation of a hair-dresser, or of a +working tallow-chandler, cannot be a matter of honor to any person,—to +say nothing of a number of other more servile employments. Such +descriptions of men ought not to suffer oppression from the state; but +the state suffers oppression, if such as they, either individually or +collectively, are permitted to rule. In this you think you are combating +prejudice, but you are at war with Nature.<a name="FNanchor_86_86" id="FNanchor_86_86"></a><a href="#Footnote_86_86" class="fnanchor" title=" Ecclesiasticus, chap, xxxviii. ver. 24, 25. "The wisdom of +a learned man cometh by opportunity of leisure: and he that hath little +business shall become wise. How can he get wisdom that holdeth the +plough, and that glorieth in the goad; that driveth oxen, and is +occupied in their labors, and whose talk is of bullocks?" + +Ver. 27. "So every carpenter and workmaster, that laboreth night and +day," &c. + +Ver. 33. "They shall not be sought for in public counsel, nor sit high +in the congregation: they shall not sit on the judge's seat, nor +understand the sentence of judgment: they cannot declare justice and +judgment, and they shall not be found where parables are spoken." + +Ver. 34. "But they will maintain the state of the world." + +I do not determine whether this book be canonical, as the Gallican +Church (till lately) has considered it, or apocryphal, as here it is +taken. I am sure it contains a great deal of sense and truth.">[86]</a></p> + +<p>I do not, my dear Sir, conceive you to be of that sophistical, captious +spirit, or of that uncandid dullness, as to require, for every general +observation or sentiment, an explicit detail of the correctives and +exceptions which reason will presume to be included in all the general +propositions which come from reason<a name="Page_297" id="Page_297" title="297" class="pagenum"></a>able men. You do not imagine that I +wish to confine power, authority, and distinction to blood and names and +titles. No, Sir. There is no qualification for government but virtue and +wisdom, actual or presumptive. Wherever they are actually found, they +have, in whatever state, condition, profession, or trade, the passport +of Heaven to human place and honor. Woe to the country which would madly +and impiously reject the service of the talents and virtues, civil, +military, or religious, that are given to grace and to serve it; and +would condemn to obscurity everything formed to diffuse lustre and glory +around a state! Woe to that country, too, that, passing into the +opposite extreme, considers a low education, a mean, contracted view of +things, a sordid, mercenary occupation, as a preferable title to +command! Everything ought to be open,—but not indifferently to every +man. No rotation, no appointment by lot, no mode of election operating +in the spirit of sortition or rotation, can be generally good in a +government conversant in extensive objects; because they have no +tendency, direct or indirect, to select the man with a view to the duty, +or to accommodate the one to the other. I do not hesitate to say that +the road to eminence and power, from obscure condition, ought not to be +made too easy, nor a thing too much of course. If rare merit be the +rarest of all rare things, it ought to pass through some sort of +probation. The temple of honor ought to be seated on an eminence. If it +be opened through virtue, let it be remembered, too, that virtue is +never tried but by some difficulty and some struggle.</p> + +<p>Nothing is a due and adequate representation of a state, that does not +represent its ability, as well as its <a name="Page_298" id="Page_298" title="298" class="pagenum"></a>property. But as ability is a +vigorous and active principle, and as property is sluggish, inert, and +timid, it never can be safe from the invasions of ability, unless it be, +out of all proportion, predominant in the representation. It must be +represented, too, in great masses of accumulation, or it is not rightly +protected. The characteristic essence of property, formed out of the +combined principles of its acquisition and conservation, is to be +<i>unequal</i>. The great masses, therefore, which excite envy, and tempt +rapacity, must be put out of the possibility of danger. Then they form a +natural rampart about the lesser properties in all their gradations. The +same quantity of property which is by the natural course of things +divided among many has not the same operation. Its defensive power is +weakened as it is diffused. In this diffusion each man's portion is less +than what, in the eagerness of his desires, he may flatter himself to +obtain by dissipating the accumulations of others. The plunder of the +few would, indeed, give but a share inconceivably small in the +distribution to the many. But the many are not capable of making this +calculation; and those who lead them to rapine never intend this +distribution.</p> + +<p>The power of perpetuating our property in our families is one of the +most valuable and interesting circumstances belonging to it, and that +which tends the most to the perpetuation of society itself. It makes our +weakness subservient to our virtue; it grafts benevolence even upon +avarice. The possessors of family wealth, and of the distinction which +attends hereditary possession, (as most concerned in it,) are the +natural securities for this transmission. With us the House of Peers is +formed upon <a name="Page_299" id="Page_299" title="299" class="pagenum"></a>this principle. It is wholly composed of hereditary +property and hereditary distinction, and made, therefore, the third of +the legislature, and, in the last event, the sole judge of all property +in all its subdivisions. The House of Commons, too, though not +necessarily, yet in fact, is always so composed, in the far greater +part. Let those large proprietors be what they will, (and they have +their chance of being amongst the best,) they are, at the very worst, +the ballast in the vessel of the commonwealth. For though hereditary +wealth, and the rank which goes with it, are too much idolized by +creeping sycophants, and the blind, abject admirers of power, they are +too rashly slighted in shallow speculations of the petulant, assuming, +short-sighted coxcombs of philosophy. Some decent, regulated +preëminence, some preference (not exclusive appropriation) given to +birth, is neither unnatural, nor unjust, nor impolitic.</p> + +<p>It is said that twenty-four millions ought to prevail over two hundred +thousand. True; if the constitution of a kingdom be a problem of +arithmetic. This sort of discourse does well enough with the lamp-post +for its second: to men who <i>may</i> reason calmly it is ridiculous The will +of the many, and their interest, must very often differ; and great will +be the difference when they make an evil choice. A government of five +hundred country attorneys and obscure curates is not good for +twenty-four millions of men, though it were chosen by eight-and-forty +millions; nor is it the better for being guided by a dozen of persons of +quality who have betrayed their trust in order to obtain that power. At +present, you seem in everything to have strayed out of the high road of +Nature. The property of France does not <a name="Page_300" id="Page_300" title="300" class="pagenum"></a>govern it. Of course property +is destroyed, and rational liberty has no existence. All you have got +for the present is a paper circulation, and a stock-jobbing +constitution: and as to the future, do you seriously think that the +territory of France, upon the republican system of eighty-three +independent municipalities, (to say nothing of the parts that compose +them,) can ever be governed as one body, or can ever be set in motion by +the impulse of one mind? When the National Assembly has completed its +work, it will have accomplished its ruin. These commonwealths will not +long bear a state of subjection to the republic of Paris. They will not +bear that this one body should monopolize the captivity of the king, and +the dominion over the assembly calling itself national. Each will keep +its own portion of the spoil of the Church to itself; and it will not +suffer either that spoil, or the more just fruits of their industry, or +the natural produce of their soil, to be sent to swell the insolence or +pamper the luxury of the mechanics of Paris. In this they will see none +of the equality, under the pretence of which they have been tempted to +throw off their allegiance to their sovereign, as well as the ancient +constitution of their country. There can be no capital city in such a +constitution as they have lately made. They have forgot, that, when they +framed democratic governments, they had virtually dismembered their +country. The person whom they persevere in calling king has not power +left to him by the hundredth part sufficient to hold together this +collection of republics. The republic of Paris will endeavor, indeed, to +complete the debauchery of the army, and illegally to perpetuate the +Assembly, without resort to its constituents, as the means of +contin<a name="Page_301" id="Page_301" title="301" class="pagenum"></a>uing its despotism. It will make efforts, by becoming the heart +of a boundless paper circulation, to draw everything to itself: but in +vain. All this policy in the end will appear as feeble as it is now +violent.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>If this be your actual situation, compared to the situation to which you +were called, as it were by the voice of God and man, I cannot find it in +my heart to congratulate you on the choice you have made, or the success +which has attended your endeavors. I can as little recommend to any +other nation a conduct grounded on such principles and productive of +such effects. That I must leave to those who can see further into your +affairs than I am able to do, and who best know how far your actions are +favorable to their designs. The gentlemen of the Revolution Society, who +were so early in their congratulations, appear to be strongly of opinion +that there is some scheme of politics relative to this country, in which +your proceedings may in some way be useful. For your Dr. Price, who +seems to have speculated himself into no small degree of fervor upon +this subject, addresses his auditors in the following very remarkable +words:—"I cannot conclude without recalling <i>particularly</i> to your +recollection a consideration which I have <i>more than once alluded to</i>, +and which probably your thoughts have <i>been all along anticipating</i>; a +consideration with which <i>my mind is impressed more than can express</i>: I +mean the consideration of the <i>favorableness of the present times to all +exertions in the cause of liberty</i>."</p> + +<p>It is plain that the mind of this <i>political</i> preacher was at the time +big with some extraordinary design; <a name="Page_302" id="Page_302" title="302" class="pagenum"></a>and it is very probable that the +thoughts of his audience, who understood him better than I do, did all +along run before him in his reflection, and in the whole train of +consequences to which it led.</p> + +<p>Before I read that sermon, I really thought I had lived in a free +country; and it was an error I cherished, because it gave me a greater +liking to the country I lived in. I was, indeed, aware that a jealous, +ever-waking vigilance, to guard the treasure of our liberty, not only +from invasion, but from decay and corruption, was our best wisdom and +our first duty. However, I considered that treasure rather as a +possession to be secured than as a prize to be contended for. I did not +discern how the present time came to be so very favorable to all +<i>exertions</i> in the cause of freedom. The present time differs from any +other only by the circumstance of what is doing in France. If the +example of that nation is to have an influence on this, I can easily +conceive why some of their proceedings which have an unpleasant aspect, +and are not quite reconcilable to humanity, generosity, good faith, and +justice, are palliated with so much milky good-nature towards the +actors, and borne with so much heroic fortitude towards the sufferers. +It is certainly not prudent to discredit the authority of an example we +mean to follow. But allowing this, we are led to a very natural +question:—What is that cause of liberty, and what are those exertions +in its favor, to which the example of France is so singularly +auspicious? Is our monarchy to be annihilated, with all the laws, all +the tribunals, and all the ancient corporations of the kingdom? Is every +landmark of the country to be done away in favor of a geometrical and +arithmetical constitution? Is the House of<a name="Page_303" id="Page_303" title="303" class="pagenum"></a> Lords to be voted useless? +Is Episcopacy to be abolished? Are the Church lands to be sold to Jews +and jobbers, or given to bribe new-invented municipal republics into a +participation in sacrilege? Are all the taxes to be voted grievances, +and the revenue reduced to a patriotic contribution or patriotic +presents? Are silver shoe-buckles to be substituted in the place of the +land-tax and the malt-tax, for the support of the naval strength of this +kingdom? Are all orders, ranks, and distinctions to be confounded, that +out of universal anarchy, joined to national bankruptcy, three or four +thousand democracies should be formed into eighty-three, and that they +may all, by some sort of unknown attractive power, be organized into +one? For this great end is the army to be seduced from its discipline +and its fidelity, first by every kind of debauchery, and then by the +terrible precedent of a donative in the increase of pay? Are the curates +to be seduced from their bishops by holding out to them the delusive +hope of a dole out of the spoils of their own order? Are the citizens of +London to be drawn from their allegiance by feeding them at the expense +of their fellow-subjects? Is a compulsory paper currency to be +substituted in the place of the legal coin of this kingdom? Is what +remains of the plundered stock of public revenue to be employed in the +wild project of maintaining two armies to watch over and to fight with +each other? If these are the ends and means of the Revolution Society, I +admit they are well assorted; and France may furnish them for both with +precedents in point.</p> + +<p>I see that your example is held out to shame us. I know that we are +supposed a dull, sluggish race, rendered passive by finding our +situation tolerable, <a name="Page_304" id="Page_304" title="304" class="pagenum"></a>and prevented by a mediocrity of freedom from ever +attaining to its full perfection. Your leaders in France began by +affecting to admire, almost to adore, the British Constitution; but as +they advanced, they came to look upon it with a sovereign contempt. The +friends of your National Assembly amongst us have full as mean an +opinion of what was formerly thought the glory of their country. The +Revolution Society has discovered that the English nation is not free. +They are convinced that the inequality in our representation is a +"defect in our Constitution <i>so gross and palpable</i> as to make it +excellent chiefly in <i>form</i> and <i>theory</i>";<a name="FNanchor_87_87" id="FNanchor_87_87"></a><a href="#Footnote_87_87" class="fnanchor" title=" Discourse on the Love of our Country, 3rd edit p. 39.">[87]</a>—that a representation in +the legislature of a kingdom is not only the basis of all constitutional +liberty in it, but of "<i>all legitimate government</i>; that without it a +<i>government</i> is nothing but an <i>usurpation</i>";—that, "when the +representation is <i>partial</i>, the kingdom possesses liberty only +<i>partially</i>; and if extremely partial, it gives only a <i>semblance</i>; and +if not only extremely partial, but corruptly chosen, it becomes a +<i>nuisance</i>." Dr. Price considers this inadequacy of representation as +our <i>fundamental grievance</i>; and though, as to the corruption of this +semblance of representation, he hopes it is not yet arrived to its full +perfection of depravity, he fears that "nothing will be done towards +gaining for us this <i>essential blessing</i>, until some <i>great abuse of +power</i> again provokes our resentment, or some <i>great calamity</i> again +alarms our fears, or perhaps till the acquisition of a <i>pure and equal +representation by other countries,</i> whilst we are <i>mocked</i> with the +<i>shadow</i>, kindles our shame." To this he subjoins a note in these +words:—"A representation chosen chiefly by the<a name="Page_305" id="Page_305" title="305" class="pagenum"></a> Treasury, and a <i>few</i> +thousands of the <i>dregs</i> of the people, who are generally paid for their +votes."</p> + +<p>You will smile here at the consistency of those democratists who, when +they are not on their guard, treat the humbler part of the community +with the greatest contempt, whilst, at the same time, they pretend to +make them the depositories of all power. It would require a long +discourse to point out to you the many fallacies that lurk in the +generality and equivocal nature of the terms "inadequate +representation." I shall only say here, in justice to that old-fashioned +Constitution under which we have long prospered, that our representation +has been found perfectly adequate to all the purposes for which a +representation of the people can be desired or devised. I defy the +enemies of our Constitution to show the contrary. To detail the +particulars in which it is found so well to promote its ends would +demand a treatise on our practical Constitution. I state here the +doctrine of the revolutionists, only that you and others may see what an +opinion these gentlemen entertain of the Constitution of their country, +and why they seem to think that some great abuse of power, or some great +calamity, as giving a chance for the blessing of a Constitution +according to their ideas, would be much palliated to their feelings; you +see <i>why they</i> are so much enamored of your fair and equal +representation, which being once obtained, the same effects might +follow. You see they consider our House of Commons as only "a +semblance," "a form," "a theory," "a shadow," "a mockery," perhaps "a +nuisance."</p> + +<p>These gentlemen value themselves on being systematic, and not without +reason. They must therefore <a name="Page_306" id="Page_306" title="306" class="pagenum"></a>look on this gross and palpable defect of +representation, this fundamental grievance, (so they call it,) as a +thing not only vicious in itself, but as rendering our whole government +absolutely <i>illegitimate</i>, and not at all better than a downright +<i>usurpation</i>. Another revolution, to get rid of this illegitimate and +usurped government, would of course be perfectly justifiable, if not +absolutely necessary. Indeed, their principle, if you observe it with +any attention, goes much further than to an alteration in the election +of the House of Commons; for, if popular representation, or choice, is +necessary to the <i>legitimacy</i> of all government, the House of Lords is, +at one stroke, bastardized and corrupted in blood. That House is no +representative of the people at all, even in "semblance" or "in form." +The case of the crown is altogether as bad. In vain the crown may +endeavor to screen itself against these gentlemen by the authority of +the establishment made on the Revolution. The Revolution, which is +resorted to for a title, on their system, wants a title itself. The +Revolution is built, according to their theory, upon a basis not more +solid than our present formalities, as it was made by a House of Lords +not representing any one but themselves, and by a House of Commons +exactly such as the present, that is, as they term it, by a mere "shadow +and mockery" of representation.</p> + +<p>Something they must destroy, or they seem to themselves to exist for no +purpose. One set is for destroying the civil power through the +ecclesiastical; another for demolishing the ecclesiastic through the +civil. They are aware that the worst consequences might happen to the +public in accomplishing this double ruin of Church and State; but they +are so heated with <a name="Page_307" id="Page_307" title="307" class="pagenum"></a>their theories, that they give more than hints that +this ruin, with all the mischiefs that must lead to it and attend it, +and which to themselves appear quite certain, would not be unacceptable +to them, or very remote from their wishes. A man amongst them of great +authority, and certainly of great talents, speaking of a supposed +alliance between Church and State, says, "Perhaps <i>we must wait for the +fall of the civil powers</i>, before this most unnatural alliance be +broken. Calamitous, no doubt, will that time be. But what convulsion in +the political world ought to be a subject of lamentation, if it be +attended with so desirable an effect?" You see with what a steady eye +these gentlemen are prepared to view the greatest calamities which can +befall their country!</p> + +<p>It is no wonder, therefore, that, with these ideas of everything in +their Constitution and government at home, either in Church or State, as +illegitimate and usurped, or at best as a vain mockery, they look abroad +with an eager and passionate enthusiasm. Whilst they are possessed by +these notions, it is vain to talk to them of the practice of their +ancestors, the fundamental laws of their country, the fixed form of a +Constitution whose merits are confirmed by the solid test of long +experience and an increasing public strength and national prosperity. +They despise experience as the wisdom of unlettered men; and as for the +rest, they have wrought under ground a mine that will blow up, at one +grand explosion, all examples of antiquity, all precedents, charters, +and acts of Parliament. They have "the rights of men." Against these +there can be no prescription; against these no argument is binding: +these admit no temperament and no compromise: any<a name="Page_308" id="Page_308" title="308" class="pagenum"></a>thing withheld from +their full demand is so much of fraud and injustice. Against these their +rights of men let no government look for security in the length of its +continuance, or in the justice and lenity of its administration. The +objections of these speculatists, if its forms do not quadrate with +their theories, are as valid against such an old and beneficent +government as against the most violent tyranny or the greenest +usurpation. They are always at issue with governments, not on a question +of abuse, but a question of competency and a question of title. I have +nothing to say to the clumsy subtilty of their political metaphysics. +Let them be their amusement in the schools.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4"><i>Illa</i> se jactet in aula<br /></span> +<span>Æolus, et clauso ventorum carcere regnet.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="noindent">But let them not break prison to burst like a Levanter, to sweep the +earth with their hurricane, and to break up the fountains of the great +deep to overwhelm us!</p> + +<p>Far am I from denying in theory, full as far is my heart from +withholding in practice, (if I were of power to give or to withhold,) +the <i>real</i> rights of men. In denying their false claims of right, I do +not mean to injure those which are real, and are such as their pretended +rights would totally destroy. If civil society be made for the advantage +of man, all the advantages for which it is made become his right. It is +an institution of beneficence; and law itself is only beneficence acting +by a rule. Men have a right to live by that rule; they have a right to +justice, as between their fellows, whether their fellows are in politic +function or in ordinary occupation. They have a right to the fruits of +their industry, and to the means of making <a name="Page_309" id="Page_309" title="309" class="pagenum"></a>their industry fruitful. +They have a right to the acquisitions of their parents, to the +nourishment and improvement of their offspring, to instruction in life +and to consolation in death. Whatever each man can separately do, +without trespassing upon others, he has a right to do for himself; and +he has a right to a fair portion of all which society, with all its +combinations of skill and force, can do in his favor. In this +partnership all men have equal rights; but not to equal things. He that +has but five shillings in the partnership has as good a right to it as +he that has five hundred pounds has to his larger proportion; but he has +not a right to an equal dividend in the product of the joint stock. And +as to the share of power, authority, and direction which each individual +ought to have in the management of the state, that I must deny to be +amongst the direct original rights of man in civil society; for I have +in my contemplation the civil social man, and no other. It is a thing to +be settled by convention.</p> + +<p>If civil society be the offspring of convention, that convention must be +its law. That convention must limit and modify all the descriptions of +constitution which are formed under it. Every sort of legislative, +judicial, or executory power are its creatures. They can have no being +in any other state of things; and how can any man claim, under the +conventions of civil society, rights which do not so much as suppose its +existence,—rights which are absolutely repugnant to it? One of the +first motives to civil society, and which becomes one of its fundamental +rules, is, <i>that no man should be judge in his own cause</i>. By this each +person has at once divested himself of the first fundamental right of +uncovenanted man, <a name="Page_310" id="Page_310" title="310" class="pagenum"></a>that is, to judge for himself, and to assert his own +cause. He abdicates all right to be his own governor. He inclusively, in +a great measure, abandons the right of self-defence, the first law of +Nature. Men cannot enjoy the rights of an uncivil and of a civil state +together. That he may obtain justice, he gives up his right of +determining what it is in points the most essential to him. That he may +secure some liberty, he makes a surrender in trust of the whole of it.</p> + +<p>Government is not made in virtue of natural rights, which may and do +exist in total independence of it,—and exist in much greater clearness, +and in a much greater degree of abstract perfection: but their abstract +perfection is their practical defect. By having a right to everything +they want everything. Government is a contrivance of human wisdom to +provide for human <i>wants</i>. Men have a right that these wants should be +provided for by this wisdom. Among these wants is to be reckoned the +want, out of civil society, of a sufficient restraint upon their +passions. Society requires not only that the passions of individuals +should be subjected, but that even in the mass and body, as well as in +the individuals, the inclinations of men should frequently be thwarted, +their will controlled, and their passions brought into subjection. This +can only be done <i>by a power out of themselves</i>, and not, in the +exercise of its function, subject to that will and to those passions +which it is its office to bridle and subdue. In this sense the +restraints on men, as well as their liberties, are to be reckoned among +their rights. But as the liberties and the restrictions vary with times +and circumstances, and admit of infinite modifications, they cannot be +settled upon any <a name="Page_311" id="Page_311" title="311" class="pagenum"></a>abstract rule; and nothing is so foolish as to discuss +them upon that principle.</p> + +<p>The moment you abate anything from the full rights of men each to govern +himself, and suffer any artificial, positive limitation upon those +rights, from that moment the whole organization of government becomes a +consideration of convenience. This it is which makes the constitution of +a state, and the due distribution of its powers, a matter of the most +delicate and complicated skill. It requires a deep knowledge of human +nature and human necessities, and of the things which facilitate or +obstruct the various ends which are to be pursued by the mechanism of +civil institutions. The state is to have recruits to its strength and +remedies to its distempers. What is the use of discussing a man's +abstract right to food or medicine? The question is upon the method of +procuring and administering them. In that deliberation I shall always +advise to call in the aid of the farmer and the physician, rather than +the professor of metaphysics.</p> + +<p>The science of constructing a commonwealth, or renovating it, or +reforming it, is, like every other experimental science, not to be +taught <i>a priori</i>. Nor is it a short experience that can instruct us in +that practical science; because the real effects of moral causes are not +always immediate, but that which in the first instance is prejudicial +may be excellent in its remoter operation, and its excellence may arise +even from the ill effects it produces in the beginning. The reverse also +happens; and very plausible schemes, with very pleasing commencements, +have often shameful and lamentable conclusions. In states there are +often some obscure and almost la<a name="Page_312" id="Page_312" title="312" class="pagenum"></a>tent causes, things which appear at +first view of little moment, on which a very great part of its +prosperity or adversity may most essentially depend. The science of +government being, therefore, so practical in itself, and intended for +such practical purposes, a matter which requires experience, and even +more experience than any person can gain in his whole life, however +sagacious and observing he may be, it is with infinite caution that any +man ought to venture upon pulling down an edifice which has answered in +any tolerable degree for ages the common purposes of society, or on +building it up again without having models and patterns of approved +utility before his eyes.</p> + +<p>These metaphysic rights entering into common life, like rays of light +which pierce into a dense medium, are, by the laws of Nature, refracted +from their straight line. Indeed, in the gross and complicated mass of +human passions and concerns, the primitive rights of men undergo such a +variety of refractions and reflections that it becomes absurd to talk of +them as if they continued in the simplicity of their original direction. +The nature of man is intricate; the objects of society are of the +greatest possible complexity: and therefore no simple disposition or +direction of power can be suitable either to man's nature or to the +quality of his affairs. When I hear the simplicity of contrivance aimed +at and boasted of in any new political constitutions, I am at no loss to +decide that the artificers are grossly ignorant of their trade or +totally negligent of their duty. The simple governments are +fundamentally defective, to say no worse of them. If you were to +contemplate society in but one point of view, all these simple modes <a name="Page_313" id="Page_313" title="313" class="pagenum"></a>of +polity are infinitely captivating. In effect each would answer its +single end much more perfectly than the more complex is able to attain +all its complex purposes. But it is better that the whole, should be +imperfectly and anomalously answered than that while some parts are +provided for with great exactness, others might be totally neglected, or +perhaps materially injured, by the over-care of a favorite member.</p> + +<p>The pretended rights of these theorists are all extremes; and in +proportion as they are metaphysically true, they are morally and +politically false. The rights of men are in a sort of <i>middle</i>, +incapable of definition, but not impossible to be discerned. The rights +of men in governments are their advantages; and these are often in +balances between differences of good,—in compromises sometimes between +good and evil, and sometimes between evil and evil. Political reason is +a computing principle: adding, subtracting, multiplying, and dividing, +morally, and not metaphysically or mathematically, true moral +denominations.</p> + +<p>By these theorists the right of the people is almost always +sophistically confounded with their power. The body of the community, +whenever it can come to act, can meet with no effectual resistance; but +till power and right are the same, the whole body of them has no right +inconsistent with virtue, and the first of all virtues, prudence. Men +have no right to what is not reasonable, and to what is not for their +benefit; for though a pleasant writer said, "<i>Liceat perire poetis</i>," +when one of them, in cold blood, is said to have leaped into the flames +of a volcanic revolution, "<i>ardentem frigidus Ætnam insiluit</i>," I +consider such a frolic rather as an unjustifiable poetic license than +<a name="Page_314" id="Page_314" title="314" class="pagenum"></a>as one of the franchises of Parnassus; and whether he were poet, or +divine, or politician, that chose to exercise this kind of right, I +think that more wise, because more charitable, thoughts would urge me +rather to save the man than to preserve his brazen slippers as the +monuments of his folly.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>The kind of anniversary sermons to which a great part of what I write +refers, if men are not shamed out of their present course, in +commemorating the fact, will cheat many out of the principles and +deprive them of the benefits of the Revolution they commemorate. I +confess to you, Sir, I never liked this continual talk of resistance and +revolution, or the practice of making the extreme medicine of the +Constitution its daily bread. It renders the habit of society +dangerously valetudinary; it is taking periodical doses of mercury +sublimate, and swallowing down repeated provocatives of cantharides to +our love of liberty.</p> + +<p>This distemper of remedy, grown habitual, relaxes and wears out, by a +vulgar and prostituted use, the spring of that spirit which is to be +exerted on great occasions. It was in the most patient period of Roman +servitude that themes of tyrannicide made the ordinary exercise of boys +at school,—<i>cum perimit sævos classis numerosa tyrannos</i>. In the +ordinary state of things, it produces in a country like ours the worst +effects, even on the cause of that liberty which it abuses with the +dissoluteness of an extravagant speculation. Almost all the high-bred +republicans of my time have, after a short space, become the most +decided, thorough-paced courtiers; they soon left the business of a +tedious, moderate, but practical <a name="Page_315" id="Page_315" title="315" class="pagenum"></a>resistance, to those of us whom, in +the pride and intoxication of their theories, they have slighted as not +much better than Tories. Hypocrisy, of course, delights in the most +sublime speculations; for, never intending to go beyond speculation, it +costs nothing to have it magnificent. But even in cases where rather +levity than fraud was to be suspected in these ranting speculations, the +issue has been much the same. These professors, finding their extreme +principles not applicable to cases which call only for a qualified, or, +as I may say, civil and legal resistance, in such cases employ no +resistance at all. It is with them a war or a revolution, or it is +nothing. Finding their schemes of politics not adapted to the state of +the world in which they live, they often come to think lightly of all +public principle, and are ready, on their part, to abandon for a very +trivial interest what they find of very trivial value. Some, indeed, are +of more steady and persevering natures; but these are eager politicians +out of Parliament, who have little to tempt them to abandon their +favorite projects. They have some change in the Church or State, or +both, constantly in their view. When that is the case, they are always +bad citizens, and perfectly unsure connections. For, considering their +speculative designs as of infinite value, and the actual arrangement of +the state as of no estimation, they are, at best, indifferent about it. +They see no merit in the good, and no fault in the vicious management of +public affairs; they rather rejoice in the latter, as more propitious to +revolution. They see no merit or demerit in any man, or any action, or +any political principle, any further than as they may forward or retard +their design of change; they therefore take up, <a name="Page_316" id="Page_316" title="316" class="pagenum"></a>one day, the most +violent and stretched prerogative, and another time the wildest +democratic ideas of freedom, and pass from the one to the other without +any sort of regard to cause, to person, or to party.</p> + +<p>In France you are now in the crisis of a revolution, and in the transit +from one form of government to another: you cannot see that character of +men exactly in the same situation in which we see it in this country. +With us it is militant, with you it is triumphant; and you know how it +can act, when its power is commensurate to its will. I would not be +supposed to confine those observations to any description of men, or to +comprehend all men of any description within them,—no, far from it! I +am as incapable of that injustice as I am of keeping terms with those +who profess principles of extremes, and who, under the name of religion, +teach little else than wild and dangerous politics. The worst of these +politics of revolution is this: they temper and harden the breast, in +order to prepare it for the desperate strokes which are sometimes used +in extreme occasions. But as these occasions may never arrive, the mind +receives a gratuitous taint; and the moral sentiments suffer not a +little, when no political purpose is served by the depravation. This +sort of people are so taken up with their theories about the rights of +man, that they have totally forgot his nature. Without opening one new +avenue to the understanding, they have succeeded in stopping up those +that lead to the heart. They have perverted in themselves, and in those +that attend to them, all the well-placed sympathies of the human breast.</p> + +<p>This famous sermon of the Old Jewry breathes nothing but this spirit +through all the political part.<a name="Page_317" id="Page_317" title="317" class="pagenum"></a> Plots, massacres, assassinations, seem +to some people a trivial price for obtaining a revolution. A cheap, +bloodless reformation, a guiltless liberty, appear flat and vapid to +their taste. There must be a great change of scene; there must be a +magnificent stage effect; there must be a grand spectacle to rouse the +imagination, grown torpid with the lazy enjoyment of sixty years' +security, and the still unanimating repose of public prosperity. The +preacher found them all in the French Revolution. This inspires a +juvenile warmth through his whole frame. His enthusiasm kindles as he +advances; and when he arrives at his peroration, it is in a full blaze. +Then viewing, from the Pisgah of his pulpit, the free, moral, happy, +flourishing, and glorious state of France, as in a bird-eye landscape of +a promised land, he breaks out into the following rapture:—</p> + +<p>"What an eventful period is this! I am <i>thankful</i> that I have lived to +it; I could almost say, <i>Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in +peace, for mine eyes have seen thy salvation</i>.—I have lived to see a +<i>diffusion</i> of knowledge which has undermined superstition and error.—I +have lived to see <i>the rights of men</i> better understood than ever, and +nations panting for liberty which seemed to have lost the idea of it.—I +have lived to see <i>thirty millions of people</i>, indignant and resolute, +spurning at slavery, and demanding liberty with an irresistible voice; +<i>their king led in triumph, and an arbitrary monarch surrendering +himself to his subjects</i>."<a name="FNanchor_88_88" id="FNanchor_88_88"></a><a href="#Footnote_88_88" class="fnanchor" title=" Another of these reverend gentlemen, who was witness to +some of the spectacles which Paris has lately exhibited, expresses +himself thus:—"_A king dragged in submissive triumph by his conquering +subjects_ is one of those appearances of grandeur which seldom rise in +the prospect of human affairs, and which, during the remainder of my +life, I shall think of with wonder and gratification." These gentlemen +agree marvellously in their feelings.">[88]</a><a name="Page_318" id="Page_318" title="318" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>Before I proceed further, I have to remark that Dr. Price seems rather +to overvalue the great acquisitions of light which he has obtained and +diffused in this age. The last century appears to me to have been quite +as much enlightened. It had, though in a different place, a triumph as +memorable as that of Dr. Price; and some of the great preachers of that +period partook of it as eagerly as he has done in the triumph of France. +On the trial of the Reverend Hugh Peters for high treason, it was +deposed, that, when King Charles was brought to London for his trial, +the Apostle of Liberty in that day conducted the <i>triumph</i>. "I saw," +says the witness, "his Majesty in the coach with six horses, and Peters +riding before the king <i>triumphing</i>." Dr. Price, when he talks as if he +had made a discovery, only follows a precedent; for, after the +commencement of the king's trial, this precursor, the same Dr. Peters, +concluding a long prayer at the royal chapel at Whitehall, (he had very +triumphantly chosen his place,) said, "I have prayed and preached these +twenty years; and now I may say with old Simeon, <i>Lord, now lettest thou +thy servant depart in peace, for mine eyes have seen thy +salvation</i>."<a name="FNanchor_89_89" id="FNanchor_89_89"></a><a href="#Footnote_89_89" class="fnanchor" title=" State Trials, Vol. II. p. 360, 363.">[89]</a> Peters had not the fruits of his prayer; for he neither +departed so soon as he wished, nor in peace. He became (what I heartily +hope none of his followers may be in this country) himself a sacrifice +to the triumph which he led as pontiff. They dealt at the Restoration, +perhaps, too hardly with this poor good man. But we owe it to his memory +and <a name="Page_319" id="Page_319" title="319" class="pagenum"></a>his sufferings, that he had as much illumination and as much zeal, +and had as effectually undermined all <i>the superstition and error</i> which +might impede the great business he was engaged in, as any who follow and +repeat after him in this age, which would assume to itself an exclusive +title to the knowledge of the rights of men, and all the glorious +consequences of that knowledge.</p> + +<p>After this sally of the preacher of the Old Jewry, which differs only in +place and time, but agrees perfectly with the spirit and letter of the +rapture of 1648, the Revolution Society, the fabricators of governments, +the heroic band of <i>cashierers</i> of <i>monarchs</i>, electors of sovereigns, +and leaders of kings in triumph, strutting with a proud consciousness of +the diffusion of knowledge, of which every member had obtained so large +a share in the donative, were in haste to make a generous diffusion of +the knowledge they had thus gratuitously received. To make this +bountiful communication, they adjourned from the church in the Old Jewry +to the London Tavern, where the same Dr. Price, in whom the fumes of his +oracular tripod were not entirely evaporated, moved and carried the +resolution, or address of congratulation, transmitted by Lord Stanhope +to the National Assembly of France.</p> + +<p>I find a preacher of the Gospel profaning the beautiful and prophetic +ejaculation, commonly called "<i>Nunc dimittis</i>," made on the first +presentation of our Saviour in the temple, and applying it, with an +inhuman and unnatural rapture, to the most horrid, atrocious, and +afflicting spectacle that perhaps ever was exhibited to the pity and +indignation of mankind. This "<i>leading in triumph</i>," a thing in its best +<a name="Page_320" id="Page_320" title="320" class="pagenum"></a>form unmanly and irreligious, which fills our preacher with such +unhallowed transports, must shock, I believe, the moral taste of every +well-born mind. Several English were the stupefied and indignant +spectators of that triumph. It was (unless we have been strangely +deceived) a spectacle more resembling a procession of American savages +entering into Onondaga after some of their murders called victories, and +leading into hovels hung round with scalps their captives overpowered +with the scoffs and buffets of women as ferocious as themselves, much +more than it resembled the triumphal pomp of a civilized martial +nation;—if a civilized nation, or any men who had a sense of +generosity, were capable of a personal triumph over the fallen and +afflicted.</p> + +<p>This, my dear Sir, was not the triumph of France. I must believe, that, +as a nation, it overwhelmed you with shame and horror. I must believe +that the National Assembly find themselves in a state of the greatest +humiliation in not being able to punish the authors of this triumph or +the actors in it, and that they are in a situation in which any inquiry +they may make upon the subject must be destitute even of the appearance +of liberty or impartiality. The apology of that assembly is found in +their situation; but when we approve what they <i>must</i> bear, it is in us +the degenerate choice of a vitiated mind.</p> + +<p>With a compelled appearance of deliberation, they vote under the +dominion of a stern necessity. They sit in the heart, as it were, of a +foreign republic: they have their residence in a city whose constitution +has emanated neither from the charter of their king nor from their +legislative power. There they are surrounded by an army not raised +either by the au<a name="Page_321" id="Page_321" title="321" class="pagenum"></a>thority of their crown or by their command, and which, +if they should order to dissolve itself, would instantly dissolve them. +There they sit, after a gang of assassins had driven away some hundreds +of the members; whilst those who held the same moderate principles, with +more patience or better hope, continued every day exposed to outrageous +insults and murderous threats. There a majority, sometimes real, +sometimes pretended, captive itself, compels a captive king to issue as +royal edicts, at third hand, the polluted nonsense of their most +licentious and giddy coffee-houses. It is notorious that all their +measures are decided before they are debated. It is beyond doubt, that, +under the terror of the bayonet, and the lamp-post, and the torch to +their houses, they are obliged to adopt all the crude and desperate +measures suggested by clubs composed of a monstrous medley of all +conditions, tongues, and nations. Among these are found persons in +comparison of whom Catiline would be thought scrupulous, and Cethegus a +man of sobriety and moderation. Nor is it in these clubs alone that the +public measures are deformed into monsters. They undergo a previous +distortion in academies, intended as so many seminaries for these clubs, +which are set up in all the places of public resort. In these meetings +of all sorts, every counsel, in proportion as it is daring and violent +and perfidious, is taken for the mark of superior genius. Humanity and +compassion are ridiculed as the fruits of superstition and ignorance. +Tenderness to individuals is considered as treason to the public. +Liberty is always to be estimated perfect as property is rendered +insecure. Amidst assassination, massacre, and confiscation, perpetrated +or <a name="Page_322" id="Page_322" title="322" class="pagenum"></a>meditated, they are forming plans for the good order of future +society. Embracing in their arms the carcasses of base criminals, and +promoting their relations on the title of their offences, they drive +hundreds of virtuous persons to the same end, by forcing them to subsist +by beggary or by crime.</p> + +<p>The Assembly, their organ, acts before them the farce of deliberation +with as little decency as liberty. They act like the comedians of a +fair, before a riotous audience; they act amidst the tumultuous cries of +a mixed mob of ferocious men, and of women lost to shame, who, according +to their insolent fancies, direct, control, applaud, explode them, and +sometimes mix and take their seats amongst them,—domineering over them +with a strange mixture of servile petulance and proud, presumptuous +authority. As they have inverted order in all things, the gallery is in +the place of the house. This assembly, which overthrows kings and +kingdoms, has not even the physiognomy and aspect of a grave legislative +body,—<i>nec color imperii, nec frons erat ulla senatûs</i>. They have a +power given to them, like that of the Evil Principle, to subvert and +destroy,—but none to construct, except such machines as may be fitted +for further subversion and further destruction.</p> + +<p>Who is it that admires, and from the heart is attached to national +representative assemblies, but must turn with horror and disgust from +such a profane burlesque and abominable perversion of that sacred +institute? Lovers of monarchy, lovers of republics, must alike abhor it. +The members of your Assembly must themselves groan under the tyranny of +which they have all the shame, none of the direction, and little of the +profit. I am sure many of the <a name="Page_323" id="Page_323" title="323" class="pagenum"></a>members who compose even the majority of +that body must feel as I do, notwithstanding the applauses of the +Revolution Society. Miserable king! miserable assembly! How must that +assembly be silently scandalized with those of their members who could +call a day which seemed to blot the sun out of heaven "<i>un beau +jour</i>"!<a name="FNanchor_90_90" id="FNanchor_90_90"></a><a href="#Footnote_90_90" class="fnanchor" title=" 6th of October, 1789.">[90]</a> How must they be inwardly indignant at hearing others who +thought fit to declare to them, "that the vessel of the state would fly +forward in her course towards regeneration with more speed than ever," +from the stiff gale of treason and murder which preceded our preacher's +triumph! What must they have felt, whilst, with outward patience and +inward indignation, they heard of the slaughter of innocent gentlemen in +their houses, that "the blood spilled was not the most pure"! What must +they have felt, when they were besieged by complaints of disorders which +shook their country to its foundations, at being compelled coolly to +tell the complainants that they were under the protection of the law, +and that they would address the king (the captive king) to cause the +laws to be enforced for their protection, when the enslaved ministers of +that captive king had formally notified to them that there were neither +law nor authority nor power left to protect! What must they have felt at +being obliged, as a felicitation on the present new year, to request +their captive king to forget the stormy period of the last, on account +of the great good which <i>he</i> was likely to produce to his people,—to +the complete attainment of which good they adjourned the practical +demonstrations of their loyalty, assuring him of their obedience when he +should no longer possess any authority to command!<a name="Page_324" id="Page_324" title="324" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>This address was made with much good-nature and affection, to be sure. +But among the revolutions in France must be reckoned a considerable +revolution in their ideas of politeness. In England we are said to learn +manners at second-hand from your side of the water, and that we dress +our behavior in the frippery of France. If so, we are still in the old +cut, and have not so far conformed to the new Parisian mode of good +breeding as to think it quite in the most refined strain of delicate +compliment (whether in condolence or congratulation) to say, to the most +humiliated creature that crawls upon the earth, that great public +benefits are derived from the murder of his servants, the attempted +assassination of himself and of his wife, and the mortification, +disgrace, and degradation that he has personally suffered. It is a topic +of consolation which our ordinary of Newgate would be too humane to use +to a criminal at the foot of the gallows. I should have thought that the +hangman of Paris, now that he is liberalized by the vote of the National +Assembly, and is allowed his rank and arms in the Herald's College of +the rights of men, would be too generous, too gallant a man, too full of +the sense of his new dignity, to employ that cutting consolation to any +of the persons whom the <i>lèze-nation</i> might bring under the +administration of his <i>executive powers</i>.</p> + +<p>A man is fallen indeed, when he is thus flattered. The anodyne draught +of oblivion, thus drugged, is well calculated to preserve a galling +wakefulness, and to feed the living ulcer of a corroding memory. Thus to +administer the opiate potion of amnesty, powdered with all the +ingredients of scorn and contempt, is to hold to his lips, instead of +"the balm of <a name="Page_325" id="Page_325" title="325" class="pagenum"></a>hurt minds," the cup of human misery full to the brim, and +to force him to drink it to the dregs.</p> + +<p>Yielding to reasons at least as forcible as those which were so +delicately urged in the compliment on the new year, the king of France +will probably endeavor to forget these events and that compliment. But +History, who keeps a durable record of all our acts, and exercises her +awful censure over the proceedings of all sorts of sovereigns, will not +forget either those events, or the era of this liberal refinement in the +intercourse of mankind. History will record, that, on the morning of the +sixth of October, 1789, the king and queen of France, after a day of +confusion, alarm, dismay, and slaughter, lay down, under the pledged +security of public faith, to indulge nature in a few hours of respite, +and troubled, melancholy repose. From this sleep the queen was first +startled by the voice of the sentinel at her door, who cried out to her +to save herself by flight,—that this was the last proof of fidelity he +could give,—that they were upon him, and he was dead. Instantly he was +cut down. A band of cruel ruffians and assassins, reeking with his +blood, rushed into the chamber of the queen, and pierced with a hundred +strokes of bayonets and poniards the bed, from whence this persecuted +woman had but just time to fly almost naked, and, through ways unknown +to the murderers, had escaped to seek refuge at the feet of a king and +husband not secure of his own life for a moment.</p> + +<p>This king, to say no more of him, and this queen, and their infant +children, (who once would have been the pride and hope of a great and +generous people,) were then forced to abandon the sanctuary of the most +splendid palace in the world, which they left <a name="Page_326" id="Page_326" title="326" class="pagenum"></a>swimming in blood, +polluted by massacre, and strewed with scattered limbs and mutilated +carcasses. Thence they were conducted into the capital of their kingdom. +Two had been selected from the unprovoked, unresisted, promiscuous +slaughter which was made of the gentlemen of birth and family who +composed the king's body-guard. These two gentlemen, with all the parade +of an execution of justice, were cruelly and publicly dragged to the +block, and beheaded in the great court of the palace. Their heads were +stuck upon spears, and led the procession; whilst the royal captives who +followed in the train were slowly moved along, amidst the horrid yells, +and shrilling screams, and frantic dances, and infamous contumelies, and +all the unutterable abominations of the furies of hell, in the abused +shape of the vilest of women. After they had been made to taste, drop by +drop, more than the bitterness of death, in the slow torture of a +journey of twelve miles, protracted to six hours, they were, under a +guard composed of those very soldiers who had thus conducted them +through this famous triumph, lodged in one of the old palaces of Paris, +now converted into a Bastile for kings.</p> + +<p>Is this a triumph to be consecrated at altars, to be commemorated with +grateful thanksgiving, to be offered to the Divine Humanity with fervent +prayer and enthusiastic ejaculation?—These Theban and Thracian orgies, +acted in France, and applauded only in the Old Jewry, I assure you, +kindle prophetic enthusiasm in the minds but of very few people in this +kingdom: although a saint and apostle, who may have revelations of his +own, and who has so completely vanquished all the mean superstitions of +the heart, may incline to think it pious and decorous to <a name="Page_327" id="Page_327" title="327" class="pagenum"></a>compare it +with the entrance into the world of the Prince of Peace, proclaimed in +an holy temple by a venerable sage, and not long before not worse +announced by the voice of angels to the quiet innocence of shepherds.</p> + +<p>At first I was at a loss to account for this fit of unguarded transport. +I knew, indeed, that the sufferings of monarchs make a delicious repast +to some sort of palates. There were reflections which might serve to +keep this appetite within some bounds of temperance. But when I took one +circumstance into my consideration, I was obliged to confess that much +allowance ought to be made for the society, and that the temptation was +too strong for common discretion: I mean, the circumstance of the Io +Pæan of the triumph, the animating cry which called for "<i>all</i> the +BISHOPS to be hanged on the lamp-posts,"<a name="FNanchor_91_91" id="FNanchor_91_91"></a><a href="#Footnote_91_91" class="fnanchor" title=" "Tous les Évêques à la lanterne!"">[91]</a> might well have brought +forth a burst of enthusiasm on the foreseen consequences of this happy +day. I allow to so much enthusiasm some little deviation from prudence. +I allow this prophet to break forth into hymns of joy and thanksgiving +on an event which appears like the precursor of the Millennium, and the +projected Fifth Monarchy, in the destruction of all Church +establishments. There was, however, (as in all human affairs there is,) +in the midst of this joy, something to exercise the patience of these +worthy gentlemen, and to try the long-suffering of their faith. The +actual murder of the king and queen, and their child, was wanting to the +other auspicious circumstances of this "<i>beautiful day</i>". The actual +murder of the bishops, though called for by so many holy ejaculations, +was also wanting. A group of <a name="Page_328" id="Page_328" title="328" class="pagenum"></a>regicide and sacrilegious slaughter was, +indeed, boldly sketched, but it was only sketched. It unhappily was left +unfinished, in this great history-piece of the massacre of innocents. +What hardy pencil of a great master, from the school of the rights of +men, will finish it, is to be seen hereafter. The age has not yet the +complete benefit of that diffusion of knowledge that has undermined +superstition and error; and the king of France wants another object or +two to consign to oblivion, in consideration of all the good which is to +arise from his own sufferings, and the patriotic crimes of an +enlightened age.<a name="FNanchor_92_92" id="FNanchor_92_92"></a><a href="#Footnote_92_92" class="fnanchor" title=" It is proper here to refer to a letter written upon this +subject by an eyewitness. That eyewitness was one of the most honest, +intelligent, and eloquent members of the National Assembly, one of the +most active and zealous reformers of the state. He was obliged to secede +from the Assembly; and he afterwards became a voluntary exile, on +account of the horrors of this pious triumph, and the dispositions of +men, who, profiting of crimes, if not causing them, have taken the lead +in public affairs. + +_Extract of M. de Lally Tollendal's Second Letter to a Friend_. + +"Parlons du parti que j'ai pris; il est bien justifé dans ma +conscience.—Ni cette ville coupable, ni cette assemblée plus coupable +encore, ne méritoient que je me justifie; mais j'ai à cœur que vous, et +les personnes qui pensent comme vous, ne me condamnent pas.—Ma santé, +je vous jure, me rendoit mes fonctions impossibles; mais même en les +mettant de côté il a été au-dessus de mes forces de supporter plus +longtems l'horreur que me causoit ce sang,—ces têtes,—cette reine +_presque egorgée_,—ce roi, amené _esclave_, entrant à Paris au milieu +de ses assassins, et précédé des têtes de ses malheureux gardes,—ces +perfides janissaires, ces assassins, ces femmes cannibales,—ce cri de +TOUS LES ÉVÊQUES À LA LANTERNE, dans le moment où le roi entre sa +capitale avec deux évêques de son conseil dans sa voiture,—un _coup de +fusil_, que j'ai vu tirer dans un _des carrosses de la reine_,—M. +Bailly appellant cela _un beau jour_,—l'assemblée ayant déclaré +froidement le matin, qu'il n'étoit pas de sa dignité d'aller toute +entière environner le roi,—M. Mirabeau disant impunément dans cette +assemblée, que le vaisseau de l'état, loin d'être arrêté dans sa course, +s'élanceroit avec plus de rapidité que jamais vers sa régénération,—M. +Barnave, riant avec lui, quand des flots de sang couloient autour de +nous,—le vertueux Mounier échappant par miracle à vingt assassins, +qui avoient voulu faire de sa tête un trophée de plus: Voilà ce qui me +fit jurer de ne plus mettre le pied _dans cette caverne d'Antropophages_ +[The National Assembly], où je n'avois plus de force d'élever la voix, +où depuis six semaines je l'avois élevée en vain. + +"Moi, Mounier, et tous les honnêtes gens, ont pensé que le dernier +effort à faire pour le bien étoit d'en sortir. Aucune idée de crainte ne +s'est approchée de moi. Je rougirois de m'en défendre. J'avois encore +reçû sur la route de la part de ce peuple, moins coupable que ceux qui +l'ont enivré de fureur, des acclamations, et des applaudissements, dont +d'autres auroient été flattés, et qui m'ont fait frémir. C'est à +l'indignation, c'est à l'horreur, c'est aux convulsions physiques, que +le seul aspect du sang me fait éprouver que j'ai cédé. On brave une +seule mort; on la brave plusieurs fois, quand elle peut être utile. Mais +aucune puissance sous le ciel, mais aucune opinion publique ou privée +n'ont le droit de me condamner à souffrir inutilement mille supplices +par minute, et à périr de désespoir, de rage, au milieu des _triomphes_, +du crime que je n'ai pu arrêter. Ils me proscriront, ils confisqueront +mes biens. Je labourerai la terre, et je ne les verrai plus. Voilà ma +justification. Vous pourrez la lire, la montrer, la laisser copier; tant +pis pour ceux qui ne la comprendront pas; ce ne sera alors moi qui +auroit eu tort de la leur donner." + +This military man had not so good nerves as the peaceable gentlemen of +the Old Jewry.—See Mons. Mounier's narrative of these transactions: a +man also of honor and virtue and talents, and therefore a fugitive.">[92]</a></p> + +<p><a name="Page_329" id="Page_329" title="329" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>Although this work of our new light and knowledge did not go to the +length that in all probability it was intended it should be carried, yet +I must think that such treatment of any human creatures must be shocking +to any but those who are made for accomplishing revolutions. But I +cannot stop here. Influenced by the inborn feelings of my nature, and +not <a name="Page_330" id="Page_330" title="330" class="pagenum"></a>being illuminated by a single ray of this new-sprung modern light, +I confess to you, Sir, that the exalted rank of the persons suffering, +and particularly the sex, the beauty, and the amiable qualities of the +descendant of so many kings and emperors, with the tender age of royal +infants, insensible only through infancy and innocence of the cruel +outrages to which their parents were exposed, instead of being a subject +of exultation, adds not a little to my sensibility on that most +melancholy occasion.</p> + +<p>I hear that the august person who was the principal object of our +preacher's triumph, though he supported himself, felt much on that +shameful occasion. As a man, it became him to feel for his wife and his +children, and the faithful guards of his person that were massacred in +cold blood about him; as a prince, it became him to feel for the strange +and frightful transformation of his civilized subjects, and to be more +grieved for them than solicitous for himself. It derogates little from +his fortitude, while it adds infinitely to the honor of his humanity. I +am very sorry to say it, very sorry indeed, that such personages are in +a situation in which it is not unbecoming in us to praise the virtues of +the great.</p> + +<p>I hear, and I rejoice to hear, that the great lady, the other object of +the triumph, has borne that day, (one is interested that beings made for +suffering should suffer well,) and that she bears all the succeeding +days, that she bears the imprisonment of her husband, and her own +captivity, and the exile of her friends, and the insulting adulation of +addresses, and the whole weight of her accumulated wrongs, with a serene +patience, in a manner suited to her rank and race, and becoming the +offspring of a sovereign <a name="Page_331" id="Page_331" title="331" class="pagenum"></a>distinguished for her piety and her courage; +that, like her, she has lofty sentiments; that she feels with the +dignity of a Roman matron; that in the last extremity she will save +herself from the last disgrace; and that, if she must fall, she will +fall by no ignoble hand.</p> + +<p>It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, +then the Dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely never lighted on this +orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw +her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere +she just began to move in,—glittering like the morning-star, full of +life and splendor and joy. Oh! what a revolution! and what an heart must +I have, to contemplate without emotion that elevation and that fall! +Little did I dream, when she added titles of veneration to those of +enthusiastic, distant, respectful love, that she should ever be obliged +to carry the sharp antidote against disgrace concealed in that bosom! +little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fallen +upon her in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor, and of +cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their +scabbards to avenge even a look that threatened her with insult. But the +age of chivalry is gone. That of sophisters, economists, and calculators +has succeeded; and the glory of Europe is extinguished forever. Never, +never more, shall we behold that generous loyalty to rank and sex, that +proud submission, that dignified obedience, that subordination of the +heart, which kept alive, even in servitude itself, the spirit of an +exalted freedom! The unbought grace of life, the cheap defence of +nations, the nurse of manly sentiment and <a name="Page_332" id="Page_332" title="332" class="pagenum"></a>heroic enterprise, is gone! +It is gone, that sensibility of principle, that chastity of honor, which +felt a stain like a wound, which inspired courage whilst it mitigated +ferocity, which ennobled whatever it touched, and under which vice +itself lost half its evil by losing all its grossness!</p> + +<p>This mixed system of opinion and sentiment had its origin in the ancient +chivalry; and the principle, though varied in its appearance by the +varying state of human affairs, subsisted and influenced through a long +succession of generations, even to the time we live in. If it should +ever be totally extinguished, the loss, I fear, will be great. It is +this which has given its character to modern Europe. It is this which +has distinguished it under all its forms of government, and +distinguished it to its advantage, from the states of Asia, and possibly +from those states which flourished in the most brilliant periods of the +antique world. It was this, which, without confounding ranks, had +produced a noble equality, and handed it down through all the gradations +of social life. It was this opinion which mitigated kings into +companions, and raised private men to be fellows with kings. Without +force or opposition, it subdued the fierceness of pride and power; it +obliged sovereigns to submit to the soft collar of social esteem, +compelled stern authority to submit to elegance, and gave a domination, +vanquisher of laws, to be subdued by manners.</p> + +<p>But now all is to be changed. All the pleasing illusions which made +power gentle and obedience liberal, which harmonized the different +shades of life, and which by a bland assimilation incorporated into +politics the sentiments which beautify and soften private society, are +to be dissolved by this new con<a name="Page_333" id="Page_333" title="333" class="pagenum"></a>quering empire of light and reason. All +the decent drapery of life is to be rudely torn off. All the superadded +ideas, furnished from the wardrobe of a moral imagination, which the +heart owns and the understanding ratifies, as necessary to cover the +defects of our naked, shivering nature, and to raise it to dignity in +our own estimation, are to be exploded, as a ridiculous, absurd, and +antiquated fashion.</p> + +<p>On this scheme of things, a king is but a man, a queen is but a woman, a +woman is but an animal,—and an animal not of the highest order. All +homage paid to the sex in general as such, and without distinct views, +is to be regarded as romance and folly. Regicide, and parricide, and +sacrilege, are but fictions of superstition, corrupting jurisprudence by +destroying its simplicity. The murder of a king, or a queen, or a +bishop, or a father, are only common homicide,—and if the people are by +any chance or in any way gainers by it, a sort of homicide much the most +pardonable, and into which we ought not to make too severe a scrutiny.</p> + +<p>On the scheme of this barbarous philosophy, which is the offspring of +cold hearts and muddy understandings and which is as void of solid +wisdom as it is destitute of all taste and elegance, laws are to be +supported only by their own terrors, and by the concern which each +individual may find in them from his own private speculations, or can +spare to them from his own private interests. In the groves of <i>their</i> +academy, at the end of every visto, you see nothing but the gallows. +Nothing is left which engages the affections on the part of the +commonwealth. On the principles of this mechanic philosophy, our +institutions can never be embodied, if I may use the <a name="Page_334" id="Page_334" title="334" class="pagenum"></a>expression, in +persons,—so as to create in us love, veneration, admiration, or +attachment. But that sort of reason which banishes the affections is +incapable of filling their place. These public affections, combined with +manners, are required sometimes as supplements, sometimes as +correctives, always as aids to law. The precept given by a wise man, as +well as a great critic, for the construction of poems, is equally true +as to states:—"<i>Non satis est pulchra esse poemata, dulcia sunto</i>." +There ought to be a system of manners in every nation which a +well-formed mind would be disposed to relish. To make us love our +country, our country ought to be lovely.</p> + +<p>But power, of some kind or other, will survive the shock in which +manners and opinions perish; and it will find other and worse means for +its support. The usurpation, which, in order to subvert ancient +institutions, has destroyed ancient principles, will hold power by arts +similar to those by which it has acquired it. When the old feudal and +chivalrous spirit of <i>fealty</i>, which, by freeing kings from fear, freed +both kings and subjects from the precautions of tyranny, shall be +extinct in the minds of men, plots and assassinations will be +anticipated by preventive murder and preventive confiscation, and that +long roll of grim and bloody maxims which form the political code of all +power not standing on its own honor and the honor of those who are to +obey it. Kings will be tyrants from policy, when subjects are rebels +from principle.</p> + +<p>When ancient opinions and rules of life are taken away, the loss cannot +possibly be estimated. From that moment we have no compass to govern us, +nor can we know distinctly to what port we steer. Eu<a name="Page_335" id="Page_335" title="335" class="pagenum"></a>rope, undoubtedly, +taken in a mass, was in a flourishing condition the day on which your +Revolution was completed. How much of that prosperous state was owing to +the spirit of our old manners and opinions is not easy to say; but as +such causes cannot be indifferent in their operation, we must presume, +that, on the whole, their operation was beneficial.</p> + +<p>We are but too apt to consider things in the state in which we find +them, without sufficiently adverting to the causes by which they have +been produced, and possibly may be upheld. Nothing is more certain than +that our manners, our civilization, and all the good things which are +connected with manners and with, civilization, have, in this European +world of ours, depended for ages upon two principles, and were, indeed, +the result of both combined: I mean the spirit of a gentleman, and the +spirit of religion. The nobility and the clergy, the one by profession, +and the other by patronage, kept learning in existence, even in the +midst of arms and confusions, and whilst governments were rather in +their causes than formed. Learning paid back what it received to +nobility and to priesthood, and paid it with usury, by enlarging their +ideas, and by furnishing their minds. Happy, if they had all continued +to know their indissoluble union, and their proper place! Happy, if +learning, not debauched by ambition, had been satisfied to continue the +instructor, and not aspired to be the master! Along with its natural +protectors and guardians, learning will be cast into the mire and +trodden down under the hoofs of a swinish multitude.<a name="FNanchor_93_94" id="FNanchor_93_94"></a><a href="#Footnote_93_94" class="fnanchor" title=" See the fate of Bailly and Condorcet, supposed to be here +particularly alluded to. Compare the circumstances of the trial and +execution of the former with this prediction.">[93]</a><a name="Page_336" id="Page_336" title="336" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>If, as I suspect, modern letters owe more than they are always willing +to own to ancient manners, so do other interests which we value full as +much as they are worth. Even commerce, and trade, and manufacture, the +gods of our economical politicians, are themselves perhaps but +creatures, are themselves but effects, which, as first causes, we choose +to worship. They certainly grew under the same shade in which learning +flourished. They, too, may decay with their natural protecting +principles. With you, for the present at least, they all threaten to +disappear together. Where trade and manufactures are wanting to a +people, and the spirit of nobility and religion remains, sentiment +supplies, and not always ill supplies, their place; but if commerce and +the arts should be lost in an experiment to try how well a state may +stand without these old fundamental principles, what sort of a thing +must be a nation of gross, stupid, ferocious, and at the same time poor +and sordid barbarians, destitute of religion, honor, or manly pride, +possessing nothing at present, and hoping for nothing hereafter?</p> + +<p>I wish you may not be going fast, and by the shortest cut, to that +horrible and disgustful situation. Already there appears a poverty of +conception, a coarseness and vulgarity, in all the proceedings of the +Assembly and of all their instructors. Their liberty is not liberal. +Their science is presumptuous ignorance. Their humanity is savage and +brutal.</p> + +<p>It is not clear whether in England we learned those grand and decorous +principles and manners, of which considerable traces yet remain, from +you, or whether you took them from us. But to you, I think, we trace +them best. You seem to me to be<a name="Page_337" id="Page_337" title="337" class="pagenum"></a> <i>gentis incunabula nostræ</i>. France has +always more or less influenced manners in England; and when your +fountain is choked up and polluted, the stream will not run long or not +run clear with us, or perhaps with any nation. This gives all Europe, in +my opinion, but too close and connected a concern in what is done in +France. Excuse me, therefore, if I have dwelt too long on the atrocious +spectacle of the sixth of October, 1789, or have given too much scope to +the reflections which have arisen in my mind on occasion of the most +important of all revolutions, which may be dated from that day: I mean a +revolution in sentiments, manners, and moral opinions. As things now +stand, with everything respectable destroyed without us, and an attempt +to destroy within us every principle of respect, one is almost forced to +apologize for harboring the common feelings of men.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>Why do I feel so differently from the Reverend Dr. Price, and those of +his lay flock who will choose to adopt the sentiments of his +discourse?—For this plain reason: Because it is <i>natural</i> I should; +because we are so made as to be affected at such spectacles with +melancholy sentiments upon the unstable condition of mortal prosperity, +and the tremendous uncertainty of human greatness; because in those +natural feelings we learn great lessons; because in events like these +our passions instruct our reason; because, when kings are hurled from +their thrones by the Supreme Director of this great drama, and become +the objects of insult to the base and of pity to the good, we behold +such disasters in the moral as we should behold a miracle in the +physical order of things. We are alarmed into reflection; our minds<a name="Page_338" id="Page_338" title="338" class="pagenum"></a> (as +it has long since been observed) are purified by terror and pity; our +weak, unthinking pride is humbled under the dispensations of a +mysterious wisdom. Some tears might be drawn from me, if such a +spectacle were exhibited on the stage. I should be truly ashamed of +finding in myself that superficial, theatric sense of painted distress, +whilst I could exult over it in real life. With such a perverted mind, I +could never venture to show my face at a tragedy. People would think the +tears that Garrick formerly, or that Siddons not long since, have +extorted from me, were the tears of hypocrisy; I should know them to be +the tears of folly.</p> + +<p>Indeed, the theatre is a better school of moral sentiments than churches +where the feelings of humanity are thus outraged. Poets who have to deal +with an audience not yet graduated in the school of the rights of men, +and who must apply themselves to the moral constitution of the heart, +would not dare to produce such a triumph as a matter of exultation. +There, where men follow their natural impulses, they would not bear the +odious maxims of a Machiavelian policy, whether applied to the +attainment of monarchical or democratic tyranny. They would reject them +on the modern, as they once did on the ancient stage, where they could +not bear even the hypothetical proposition of such wickedness in the +mouth of a personated tyrant, though suitable to the character he +sustained. No theatric audience in Athens would bear what has been borne +in the midst of the real tragedy of this triumphal day: a principal +actor weighing, as it were in scales hung in a shop of horrors, so much +actual crime against so much contingent advantage,—and after putting in +and out <a name="Page_339" id="Page_339" title="339" class="pagenum"></a>weights, declaring that the balance was on the side of the +advantages. They would not bear to see the crimes of new democracy +posted as in a ledger against the crimes of old despotism, and the +book-keepers of politics finding democracy still in debt, but by no +means unable or unwilling to pay the balance. In the theatre, the first +intuitive glance, without any elaborate process of reasoning, would show +that this method of political computation would justify every extent of +crime. They would see, that, on these principles, even where the very +worst acts were not perpetrated, it was owing rather to the fortune of +the conspirators than to their parsimony in the expenditure of treachery +and blood. They would soon see that criminal means, once tolerated, are +soon preferred. They present a shorter cut to the object than through +the highway of the moral virtues. Justifying perfidy and murder for +public benefit, public benefit would soon become the pretext, and +perfidy and murder the end,—until rapacity, malice, revenge, and fear +more dreadful than revenge, could satiate their insatiable appetites. +Such must be the consequences of losing, in the splendor of these +triumphs of the rights of men, all natural sense of wrong and right.</p> + +<p>But the reverend pastor exults in this "leading in triumph," because, +truly, Louis the Sixteenth was "an arbitrary monarch": that is, in other +words, neither more nor less than because he was Louis the Sixteenth, +and because he had the misfortune to be born king of France, with the +prerogatives of which a long line of ancestors, and a long acquiescence +of the people, without any act of his, had put him in possession. A +misfortune it has indeed turned out to him, that he was born king of +France. But mis<a name="Page_340" id="Page_340" title="340" class="pagenum"></a>fortune is not crime, nor is indiscretion always the +greatest guilt. I shall never think that a prince, the acts of whose +whole reign were a series of concessions to his subjects, who was +willing to relax his authority, to remit his prerogatives, to call his +people to a share of freedom not known, perhaps not desired, by their +ancestors,—such a prince, though he should be subject to the common +frailties attached to men and to princes, though he should have once +thought it necessary to provide force against the desperate designs +manifestly carrying on against his person and the remnants of his +authority,—though all this should be taken into consideration, I shall +be led with great difficulty to think he deserves the cruel and +insulting triumph of Paris, and of Dr. Price. I tremble for the cause of +liberty, from such an example to kings. I tremble for the cause of +humanity, in the unpunished outrages of the most wicked of mankind. But +there are some people of that low and degenerate fashion of mind that +they look up with a sort of complacent awe and admiration to kings who +know to keep firm in their seat, to hold a strict hand over their +subjects, to assert their prerogative, and, by the awakened vigilance of +a severe despotism, to guard against the very first approaches of +freedom. Against such as these they never elevate their voice. Deserters +from principle, listed with fortune, they never see any good in +suffering virtue, nor any crime in prosperous usurpation.</p> + +<p>If it could have been made clear to me that the king and queen of France +(those, I mean, who were such before the triumph) were inexorable and +cruel tyrants, that they had formed a deliberate scheme for massacring +the National Assembly, (I think I have <a name="Page_341" id="Page_341" title="341" class="pagenum"></a>seen something like the latter +insinuated in certain publications,) I should think their captivity +just. If this be true, much more ought to have been done, but done, in +my opinion, in another manner. The punishment of real tyrants is a noble +and awful act of justice; and it has with truth been said to be +consolatory to the human mind. But if I were to punish a wicked king, I +should regard the dignity in avenging the crime. Justice is grave and +decorous, and in its punishments rather seems to submit to a necessity +than to make a choice. Had Nero, or Agrippina, or Louis the Eleventh, or +Charles the Ninth been the subject,—if Charles the Twelfth of Sweden, +after the murder of Patkul, or his predecessor, Christina, after the +murder of Monaldeschi, had fallen into your hands, Sir, or into mine, I +am sure our conduct would have been different.</p> + +<p>If the French king, or king of the French, (or by whatever name he is +known in the new vocabulary of your Constitution,) has in his own person +and that of his queen really deserved these unavowed, but unavenged, +murderous attempts, and those frequent indignities more cruel than +murder, such a person would ill deserve even that subordinate executory +trust which I understand is to be placed in him; nor is he fit to be +called chief in a nation which he has outraged and oppressed. A worse +choice for such an office in a new commonwealth than that of a deposed +tyrant could not possibly be made. But to degrade and insult a man as +the worst of criminals, and afterwards to trust him in your highest +concerns, as a faithful, honest, and zealous servant, is not consistent +in reasoning, nor prudent in policy, nor safe in practice. Those who +could make such an appoint<a name="Page_342" id="Page_342" title="342" class="pagenum"></a>ment must be guilty of a more flagrant breach +of trust than any they have yet committed against the people. As this is +the only crime in which your leading politicians could have acted +inconsistently, I conclude that there is no sort of ground for these +horrid insinuations. I think no better of all the other calumnies.</p> + +<p>In England, we give no credit to them. We are generous enemies; we are +faithful allies. We spurn from us with disgust and indignation the +slanders of those who bring us their anecdotes with the attestation of +the flower-de-luce on their shoulder. We have Lord George Gordon fast in +Newgate; and neither his being a public proselyte to Judaism, nor his +having, in his zeal against Catholic priests and all sorts of +ecclesiastics, raised a mob (excuse the term, it is still in use here) +which pulled down all our prisons, have preserved to him a liberty of +which he did not render himself worthy by a virtuous use of it. We have +rebuilt Newgate, and tenanted the mansion. We have prisons almost as +strong as the Bastile, for those who dare to libel the queens of France. +In this spiritual retreat let the noble libeller remain. Let him there +meditate on his Talmud, until he learns a conduct more becoming his +birth and parts, and not so disgraceful to the ancient religion to which +he has become a proselyte,—or until some persons from your side of the +water, to please your new Hebrew brethren, shall ransom him. He may then +be enabled to purchase, with the old hoards of the synagogue, and a very +small poundage on the long compound interest of the thirty pieces of +silver, (Dr. Price has shown us what miracles compound interest will +perform in 1790 years,) the lands which are lately dis<a name="Page_343" id="Page_343" title="343" class="pagenum"></a>covered to have +been usurped by the Gallican Church. Send us your Popish Archbishop of +Paris, and we will send you our Protestant Rabbin. We shall treat the +person you send us in exchange like a gentleman and an honest man, as he +is: but pray let him bring with him the fund of his hospitality, bounty, +and charity; and, depend upon it, we shall never confiscate a shilling +of that honorable and pious fund, nor think of enriching the Treasury +with the spoils of the poor-box.</p> + +<p>To tell you the truth, my dear Sir, I think the honor of our nation to +be somewhat concerned in the disclaimer of the proceedings of this +society of the Old Jewry and the London Tavern. I have no man's proxy. I +speak only from myself, when I disclaim, as I do with all possible +earnestness, all communion with the actors in that triumph, or with the +admirers of it. When I assert anything else, as concerning the people of +England, I speak from observation, not from authority; but I speak from +the experience I have had in a pretty extensive and mixed communication +with the inhabitants of this kingdom, of all descriptions and ranks, and +after a course of attentive observation, begun in early life, and +continued for near forty years. I have often been astonished, +considering that we are divided from you but by a slender dike of about +twenty-four miles, and that the mutual intercourse between the two +countries has lately been very great, to find how little you seem to +know of us. I suspect that this is owing to your forming a judgment of +this nation from certain publications, which do, very erroneously, if +they do at all, represent the opinions and dispositions generally +prevalent in England. The <a name="Page_344" id="Page_344" title="344" class="pagenum"></a>vanity, restlessness, petulance, and spirit +of intrigue of several petty cabals, who attempt to hide their total +want of consequence in bustle and noise, and puffing and mutual +quotation of each other, makes you imagine that our contemptuous neglect +of their abilities is a general mark of acquiescence in their opinions. +No such thing, I assure you. Because half a dozen grasshoppers under a +fern make the field ring with their importunate chink, whilst thousands +of great cattle reposed beneath the shadow of the British oak chew the +cud and are silent, pray do not imagine that those who make the noise +are the only inhabitants of the field,—that, of course, they are many +in number,—or that, after all, they are other than the little, +shrivelled, meagre, hopping, though loud and troublesome insects of the +hour.</p> + +<p>I almost venture to affirm that not one in a hundred amongst us +participates in the "triumph" of the Revolution Society. If the king and +queen of France and their children were to fall into our hands by the +chance of war, in the most acrimonious of all hostilities, (I deprecate +such an event, I deprecate such hostility,) they would be treated with +another sort of triumphal entry into London. We formerly have had a king +of France in that situation: you have read how he was treated by the +victor in the field, and in what manner he was afterwards received in +England. Four hundred years have gone over us; but I believe we are not +materially changed since that period. Thanks to our sullen resistance to +innovation, thanks to the cold sluggishness of our national character, +we still bear the stamp of our forefathers. We have not (as I conceive) +lost the generosity and dignity of thinking of the fourteenth century; +nor as yet have <a name="Page_345" id="Page_345" title="345" class="pagenum"></a>we subtilized ourselves into savages. We are not the +converts of Rousseau; we are not the disciples of Voltaire; Helvetius +has made no progress amongst us. Atheists are not our preachers; madmen +are not our lawgivers. We know that <i>we</i> have made no discoveries, and +we think that no discoveries are to be made, in morality,—nor many in +the great principles of government, nor in the ideas of liberty, which +were understood long before we were born altogether as well as they will +be after the grave has heaped its mould upon our presumption, and the +silent tomb shall have imposed its law on our pert loquacity. In England +we have not yet been completely embowelled of our natural entrails: we +still feel within us, and we cherish and cultivate, those inbred +sentiments which are the faithful guardians, the active monitors of our +duty, the true supporters of all liberal and manly morals. We have not +been drawn and trussed, in order that we may be filled, like stuffed +birds in a museum, with chaff and rags, and paltry, blurred shreds of +paper about the rights of man. We preserve the whole of our feelings +still native and entire, unsophisticated by pedantry and infidelity. We +have real hearts of flesh and blood beating in our bosoms. We fear God; +we look up with awe to kings, with affection to Parliaments, with duty +to magistrates, with reverence to priests, and with respect to +nobility.<a name="FNanchor_94_95" id="FNanchor_94_95"></a><a href="#Footnote_94_95" class="fnanchor" title=" The English are, I conceive, misrepresented in a letter +published in one of the papers, by a gentleman thought to be a +Dissenting minister. When writing to Dr. Price of the spirit which +prevails at Paris, he says,—"The spirit of the people in this place has +abolished all the proud _distinctions_ which the _king_ and _nobles_ had +usurped in their minds: whether they talk of _the king, the noble, or +the priest_, their whole language is that of the most _enlightened and +liberal amongst the English_." If this gentleman means to confine the +terms _enlightened and liberal_ to one set of men in England, it may be +true. It is not generally so.">[94]</a> Why? Because, when <a name="Page_346" id="Page_346" title="346" class="pagenum"></a>such ideas are brought before our +minds, it is <i>natural</i> to be so affected; because all other feelings are +false and spurious, and tend to corrupt our minds, to vitiate our +primary morals, to render us unfit for rational liberty, and, by +teaching us a servile, licentious, and abandoned insolence, to be our +low sport for a few holidays, to make us perfectly fit for and justly +deserving of slavery through the whole course of our lives.</p> + +<p>You see, Sir, that in this enlightened age I am bold enough to confess +that we are generally men of untaught feelings: that, instead of casting +away all our old prejudices, we cherish them to a very considerable +degree; and, to take more shame to ourselves, we cherish them because +they are prejudices; and the longer they have lasted, and the more +generally they have prevailed, the more we cherish them. We are afraid +to put men to live and trade each on his own private stock of reason; +because we suspect that the stock in each man is small, and that the +individuals would do better to avail themselves of the general bank and +capital of nations and of ages. Many of our men of speculation, instead +of exploding general prejudices, employ their sagacity to discover the +latent wisdom which prevails in them. If they find what they seek, (and +they seldom fail,) they think it more wise to continue the prejudice, +with the reason involved, than to cast away the coat of prejudice, and +to leave nothing but the naked reason; because prejudice, with its +reason, has a motive to give action to that reason, and an affection +which will give it per<a name="Page_347" id="Page_347" title="347" class="pagenum"></a>manence. Prejudice is of ready application in the +emergency; it previously engages the mind in a steady course of wisdom +and virtue, and does not leave the man hesitating in the moment of +decision, skeptical, puzzled, and unresolved. Prejudice renders a man's +virtue his habit, and not a series of unconnected acts. Through just +prejudice, his duty becomes a part of his nature.</p> + +<p>Your literary men, and your politicians, and so do the whole clan of the +enlightened among us, essentially differ in these points. They have no +respect for the wisdom of others; but they pay it off by a very full +measure of confidence in their own. With them it is a sufficient motive +to destroy an old scheme of things, because it is an old one. As to the +new, they are in no sort of fear with regard to the duration of a +building run up in haste; because duration is no object to those who +think little or nothing has been done before their time, and who place +all their hopes in discovery. They conceive, very systematically, that +all things which give perpetuity are mischievous, and therefore they are +at inexpiable war with all establishments. They think that government +may vary like modes of dress, and with as little ill effect; that there +needs no principle of attachment, except a sense of present conveniency, +to any constitution of the state. They always speak as if they were of +opinion that there is a singular species of compact between them and +their magistrates, which binds the magistrate, but which has nothing +reciprocal in it, but that the majesty of the people has a right to +dissolve it without any reason but its will. Their attachment to their +country itself is only so far as it agrees with some of their fleeting +projects: it <a name="Page_348" id="Page_348" title="348" class="pagenum"></a>begins and ends with that scheme of polity which falls in +with their momentary opinion.</p> + +<p>These doctrines, or rather sentiments, seem prevalent with your new +statesmen. But they are wholly different from those on which we have +always acted in this country.</p> + +<p>I hear it is sometimes given out in France, that what is doing among you +is after the example of England. I beg leave to affirm that scarcely +anything done with you has originated from the practice or the prevalent +opinions of this people, either in the act or in the spirit of the +proceeding. Let me add, that we are as unwilling to learn these lessons +from France as we are sure that we never taught them to that nation. The +cabals here who take a sort of share in your transactions as yet consist +of but a handful of people. If, unfortunately, by their intrigues, their +sermons, their publications, and by a confidence derived from an +expected union with the counsels and forces of the French nation, they +should draw considerable numbers into their faction, and in consequence +should seriously attempt anything here in imitation of what has been +done with you, the event, I dare venture to prophesy, will be, that, +with some trouble to their country, they will soon accomplish their own +destruction. This people refused to change their law in remote ages from +respect to the infallibility of Popes, and they will not now alter it +from a pious implicit faith in the dogmatism of philosophers,—though +the former was armed with the anathema and crusade, and though the +latter should act with the libel and the lamp-iron.</p> + +<p>Formerly your affairs were your own concern only. We felt for them as +men; but we kept aloof from <a name="Page_349" id="Page_349" title="349" class="pagenum"></a>them, because we were not citizens of +France. But when we see the model held up to ourselves, we must feel as +Englishmen, and, feeling, we must provide as Englishmen. Your affairs, +in spite of us, are made a part of our interest,—so far at least as to +keep at a distance your panacea or your plague. If it be a panacea, we +do not want it: we know the consequences of unnecessary physic. If it be +a plague, it is such a plague that the precautions of the most severe +quarantine ought to be established against it.</p> + +<p>I hear on all hands, that a cabal, calling itself philosophic, receives +the glory of many of the late proceedings, and that their opinions and +systems are the true actuating spirit of the whole of them. I have heard +of no party in England, literary or political, at any time, known by +such a description. It is not with you composed of those men, is it? +whom the vulgar, in their blunt, homely style, commonly call Atheists +and Infidels? If it be, I admit that we, too, have had writers of that +description, who made some noise in their day. At present they repose in +lasting oblivion. Who, born within the last forty years, has read one +word of Collins, and Toland, and Tindal, and Chubb, and Morgan, and that +whole race who called themselves Freethinkers? Who now reads +Bolingbroke? Who ever read him through? Ask the booksellers of London +what is become of all these lights of the world. In as few years their +few successors will go to the family vault of "all the Capulets." But +whatever they were, or are, with us they were and are wholly unconnected +individuals. With us they kept the common nature of their kind, and were +not gregarious. They never acted in corps, nor were known as a faction +in the state, nor pre<a name="Page_350" id="Page_350" title="350" class="pagenum"></a>sumed to influence in that name or character, or +for the purposes of such a faction, on any of our public concerns. +Whether they ought so to exist, and so be permitted to act, is another +question. As such cabals have not existed in England, so neither has the +spirit of them had any influence in establishing the original frame of +our Constitution, or in any one of the several reparations and +improvements it has undergone. The whole has been done under the +auspices, and is confirmed by the sanctions, of religion and piety. The +whole has emanated from the simplicity of our national character, and +from a sort of native plainness and directness of understanding, which +for a long time characterized those men who have successively obtained +authority among us. This disposition still remains,—at least in the +great body of the people.</p> + +<p>We know, and, what is better, we feel inwardly, that religion is the +basis of civil society, and the source of all good, and of all +comfort.<a name="FNanchor_95_96" id="FNanchor_95_96"></a><a href="#Footnote_95_96" class="fnanchor" title=" Sit igitur hoc ab initio persuasum civibus, dominos esse +omnium rerum ac moderatores deos; eaque, quæ gerantur, eorum geri vi, +ditione, ac numine; eosdemque optime de genere hominum mereri; et qualis +quisque sit, quid agat, quid in se admittat, qua mente, qua pietate +colat religiones intueri: piorum et impiorum habere rationem. His enim +rebus imbutæ mentes haud sane abhorrebunt ab utili et a vera +sententia.—Cic. de Legibus, l. 2.">[95]</a> In England we are so convinced of this, that there is no +rust of superstition, with which the accumulated absurdity of the human +mind might have crusted it over in the course of ages, that ninety-nine +in a hundred of the people of England would not prefer to impiety. We +shall never be such fools as to call in an enemy to the substance of any +system to remove its corruptions, to supply its defects, or to perfect +its construc<a name="Page_351" id="Page_351" title="351" class="pagenum"></a>tion. If our religious tenets should ever want a further +elucidation, we shall not call on Atheism to explain them. We shall not +light up our temple from that unhallowed fire. It will be illuminated +with other lights. It will be perfumed with other incense than the +infectious stuff which is imported by the smugglers of adulterated +metaphysics. If our ecclesiastical establishment should want a revision, +it is not avarice or rapacity, public or private, that we shall employ +for the audit or receipt or application of its consecrated revenue. +Violently condemning neither the Greek nor the Armenian, nor, since +heats are subsided, the Roman system of religion, we prefer the +Protestant: not because we think it has less of the Christian religion +in it, but because, in our judgment, it has more. We are Protestants, +not from indifference, but from zeal.</p> + +<p>We know, and it is our pride to know, that man is by his constitution a +religious animal; that atheism is against, not only our reason, but our +instincts; and that it cannot prevail long. But if, in the moment of +riot, and in a drunken delirium from the hot spirit drawn out of the +alembic of hell, which in France is now so furiously boiling, we should +uncover our nakedness, by throwing off that Christian religion which has +hitherto been our boast and comfort, and one great source of +civilization amongst us, and among many other nations, we are +apprehensive (being well aware that the mind will not endure a void) +that some uncouth, pernicious, and degrading superstition might take +place of it.</p> + +<p>For that reason, before we take from our establishment the natural, +human means of estimation, and give it up to contempt, as you have done, +and in <a name="Page_352" id="Page_352" title="352" class="pagenum"></a>doing it have incurred the penalties you well deserve to suffer, +we desire that some other may be presented to us in the place of it. We +shall then form our judgment.</p> + +<p>On these ideas, instead of quarrelling with establishments, as some do, +who have made a philosophy and a religion of their hostility to such +institutions, we cleave closely to them. We are resolved to keep an +established church, an established monarchy, an established aristocracy, +and an established democracy, each in the degree it exists, and in no +greater. I shall show you presently how much of each of these we +possess.</p> + +<p>It has been the misfortune (not, as these gentlemen think it, the glory) +of this age, that everything is to be discussed, as if the Constitution +of our country were to be always a subject rather of altercation than +enjoyment. For this reason, as well as for the satisfaction of those +among you (if any such you have among you) who may wish to profit of +examples, I venture to trouble you with a few thoughts upon each of +these establishments. I do not think they were unwise in ancient Rome, +who, when they wished to new-model their laws, sent commissioners to +examine the best-constituted republics within their reach.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>First I beg leave to speak of our Church Establishment, which is the +first of our prejudices,—not a prejudice destitute of reason, but +involving in it profound and extensive wisdom. I speak of it first. It +is first, and last, and midst in our minds. For, taking ground on that +religious system of which we are now in possession, we continue to act +on the early <a name="Page_353" id="Page_353" title="353" class="pagenum"></a>received and uniformly continued sense of mankind. That +sense not only, like a wise architect, hath built up the august fabric +of states, but, like a provident proprietor, to preserve the structure +from profanation and ruin, as a sacred temple, purged from all the +impurities of fraud and violence and injustice and tyranny, hath +solemnly and forever consecrated the commonwealth, and all that +officiate in it. This consecration is made, that all who administer in +the government of men, in which they stand in the person of God Himself, +should have high and worthy notions of their function and destination; +that their hope should be full of immortality; that they should not look +to the paltry pelf of the moment, nor to the temporary and transient +praise of the vulgar, but to a solid, permanent existence, in the +permanent part of their nature, and to a permanent fame and glory, in +the example they leave as a rich inheritance to the world.</p> + +<p>Such sublime principles ought to be infused into persons of exalted +situations, and religious establishments provided that may continually +revive and enforce them. Every sort of moral, every sort of civil, every +sort of politic institution, aiding the rational and natural ties that +connect the human understanding and affections to the divine, are not +more than necessary, in order to build up that wonderful structure, +Man,—whose prerogative it is, to be in a great degree a creature of his +own making, and who, when made as he ought to be made, is destined to +hold no trivial place in the creation. But whenever man is put over men, +as the better nature ought ever to preside, in that case more +particularly he should as nearly as possible be approximated to his +perfection.<a name="Page_354" id="Page_354" title="354" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>The consecration of the state by a state religious establishment is +necessary also to operate with a wholesome awe upon free citizens; +because, in order to secure their freedom, they must enjoy some +determinate portion of power. To them, therefore, a religion connected +with the state, and with their duty towards it, becomes even more +necessary than in such societies where the people, by the terms of their +subjection, are confined to private sentiments, and the management of +their own family concerns. All persons possessing any portion of power +ought to be strongly and awfully impressed with an idea that they act in +trust, and that they are to account for their conduct in that trust to +the one great Master, Author, and Founder of society.</p> + +<p>This principle ought even to be more strongly impressed upon the minds +of those who compose the collective sovereignty than upon those of +single princes. Without instruments, these princes can do nothing. +Whoever uses instruments, in finding helps, finds also impediments. +Their power is therefore by no means complete; nor are they safe in +extreme abuse. Such persons, however elevated by flattery, arrogance, +and self-opinion, must be sensible, that, whether covered or not by +positive law, in some way or other they are accountable even here for +the abuse of their trust. If they are not cut off by a rebellion of +their people, they may be strangled by the very janissaries kept for +their security against all other rebellion. Thus we have seen the king +of France sold by his soldiers for an increase of pay. But where popular +authority is absolute and unrestrained, the people have an infinitely +greater, because a far better founded, confidence in their own power. +They are themselves in <a name="Page_355" id="Page_355" title="355" class="pagenum"></a>a great measure their own instruments. They are +nearer to their objects. Besides, they are less under responsibility to +one of the greatest controlling powers on earth, the sense of fame and +estimation. The share of infamy that is likely to fall to the lot of +each individual in public acts is small indeed: the operation of opinion +being in the inverse ratio to the number of those who abuse power. Their +own approbation of their own acts has to them the appearance of a public +judgment in their favor. A perfect democracy is therefore the most +shameless thing in the world. As it is the most shameless, it is also +the most fearless. No man apprehends in his person that he can be made +subject to punishment. Certainly the people at large never ought: for, +as all punishments are for example towards the conservation of the +people at large, the people at large can never become the subject of +punishment by any human hand.<a name="FNanchor_96_97" id="FNanchor_96_97"></a><a href="#Footnote_96_97" class="fnanchor" title=" Quicquid multis peccatur inultum.">[96]</a> It is therefore of infinite importance +that they should not be suffered to imagine that their will, any more +than that of kings, is the standard of right and wrong. They ought to be +persuaded that they are full as little entitled, and far less qualified, +with safety to themselves, to use any arbitrary power whatsoever; that +therefore they are not, under a false show of liberty, but in truth to +exercise an unnatural, inverted domination, tyrannically to exact from +those who officiate in the state, not an entire devotion to their +interest, which is their right, but an abject submission to their +occasional will: extinguishing thereby, in all those who serve them, all +moral principle, all sense of dignity, all use of judgment, and all +consistency of character; whilst by the very same process they <a name="Page_356" id="Page_356" title="356" class="pagenum"></a>give +themselves up a proper, a suitable, but a most contemptible prey to the +servile ambition of popular sycophants or courtly flatterers.</p> + +<p>When the people have emptied themselves of all the lust of selfish will, +which without religion it is utterly impossible they ever should,—when +they are conscious that they exercise, and exercise perhaps in a higher +link of the order of delegation, the power which to be legitimate must +be according to that eternal, immutable law in which will and reason are +the same,—they will be more careful how they place power in base and +incapable hands. In their nomination to office, they will not appoint to +the exercise of authority as to a pitiful job, but as to a holy +function; not according to their sordid, selfish interest, nor to their +wanton caprice, nor to their arbitrary will; but they will confer that +power (which any man may well tremble to give or to receive) on those +only in whom they may discern that predominant proportion of active +virtue and wisdom, taken together and fitted to the charge, such as in +the great and inevitable mixed mass of human imperfections and +infirmities is to be found.</p> + +<p>When they are habitually convinced that no evil can be acceptable, +either in the act or the permission, to Him whose essence is good, they +will be better able to extirpate out of the minds of all magistrates, +civil, ecclesiastical, or military, anything that bears the least +resemblance to a proud and lawless domination.</p> + +<p>But one of the first and most leading principles on which the +commonwealth and the laws are consecrated is lest the temporary +possessors and life-renters in it, unmindful of what they have received +from their an<a name="Page_357" id="Page_357" title="357" class="pagenum"></a>cestors, or of what is due to their posterity, should act +as if they were the entire masters; that they should not think it +amongst their rights to cut off the entail or commit waste on the +inheritance, by destroying at their pleasure the whole original fabric +of their society: hazarding to leave to those who come after them a ruin +instead of an habitation,—and teaching these successors as little to +respect their contrivances as they had themselves respected the +institutions of their forefathers. By this unprincipled facility of +changing the state as often and as much and in as many ways as there are +floating fancies or fashions, the whole chain and continuity of the +commonwealth would be broken; no one generation could link with the +other; men would become little better than the flies of a summer.</p> + +<p>And first of all, the science of jurisprudence, the pride of the human +intellect, which, with all its defects, redundancies, and errors, is the +collected reason of ages, combining the principles of original justice +with the infinite variety of human concerns, as a heap of old exploded +errors, would be no longer studied. Personal self-sufficiency and +arrogance (the certain attendants upon all those who have never +experienced a wisdom greater than their own) would usurp the tribunal. +Of course no certain laws, establishing invariable grounds of hope and +fear, would keep the actions of men in a certain course, or direct them +to a certain end. Nothing stable in the modes of holding property or +exercising function could form a solid ground on which any parent could +speculate in the education of his offspring, or in a choice for their +future establishment in the world. No principles would be early worked +into the habits. As <a name="Page_358" id="Page_358" title="358" class="pagenum"></a>soon as the most able instructor had completed his +laborious course of institution, instead of sending forth his pupil +accomplished in a virtuous discipline fitted to procure him attention +and respect in his place in society, he would find everything altered, +and that he had turned out a poor creature to the contempt and derision +of the world, ignorant of the true grounds of estimation. Who would +insure a tender and delicate sense of honor to beat almost with the +first pulses of the heart, when no man could know what would be the test +of honor in a nation continually varying the standard of its coin? No +part of life would retain its acquisitions. Barbarism with regard to +science and literature, unskilfulness with regard to arts and +manufactures, would infallibly succeed to the want of a steady education +and settled principle; and thus the commonwealth itself would in a few +generations crumble away, be disconnected into the dust and powder of +individuality, and at length dispersed to all the winds of heaven.</p> + +<p>To avoid, therefore, the evils of inconstancy and versatility, ten +thousand times worse than those of obstinacy and the blindest prejudice, +we have consecrated the state, that no man should approach to look into +its defects or corruptions but with due caution; that he should never +dream of beginning its reformation by its subversion; that he should +approach to the faults of the state as to the wounds of a father, with +pious awe and trembling solicitude. By this wise prejudice we are taught +to look with horror on those children of their country who are prompt +rashly to hack that aged parent in pieces and put him into the kettle of +magicians, in hopes that by their poi<a name="Page_359" id="Page_359" title="359" class="pagenum"></a>sonous weeds and wild incantations +they may regenerate the paternal constitution and renovate their +father's life.</p> + +<p>Society is, indeed, a contract. Subordinate contracts for objects of +mere occasional interest may be dissolved at pleasure; but the state +ought not to be considered as nothing better than a partnership +agreement in a trade of pepper and coffee, calico or tobacco, or some +other such low concern, to be taken up for a little temporary interest, +and to be dissolved by the fancy of the parties. It is to be looked on +with other reverence; because it is not a partnership in things +subservient only to the gross animal existence of a temporary and +perishable nature. It is a partnership in all science, a partnership in +all art, a partnership in every virtue and in all perfection. As the +ends of such a partnership cannot be obtained in many generations, it +becomes a partnership not only between those who are living, but between +those who are living, those who are dead, and those who are to be born. +Each contract of each particular state is but a clause in the great +primeval contract of eternal society, linking the lower with the higher +natures, connecting the visible and invisible world, according to a +fixed compact sanctioned by the inviolable oath which holds all physical +and all moral natures each in their appointed place. This law is not +subject to the will of those who, by an obligation above them, and +infinitely superior, are bound to submit their will to that law. The +municipal corporations of that universal kingdom are not morally at +liberty, at their pleasure, and on their speculations of a contingent +improvement, wholly to separate and tear asunder the bands of their +subordinate community, and to <a name="Page_360" id="Page_360" title="360" class="pagenum"></a>dissolve it into an unsocial, uncivil, +unconnected chaos of elementary principles. It is the first and supreme +necessity only, a necessity that is not chosen, but chooses, a necessity +paramount to deliberation, that admits no discussion and demands no +evidence, which alone can justify a resort to anarchy. This necessity is +no exception to the rule; because this necessity itself is a part, too, +of that moral and physical disposition of things to which man must be +obedient by consent or force: but if that which is only submission to +necessity should be made the object of choice, the law is broken, Nature +is disobeyed, and the rebellious are outlawed, cast forth, and exiled, +from this world of reason, and order, and peace, and virtue, and +fruitful penitence, into the antagonist world of madness, discord, vice, +confusion, and unavailing sorrow.</p> + +<p>These, my dear Sir, are, were, and, I think, long will be, the +sentiments of not the least learned and reflecting part of this kingdom. +They who are included in this description form their opinions on such +grounds as such persons ought to form them. The less inquiring receive +them from an authority which those whom Providence dooms to live on +trust need not be ashamed to rely on. These two sorts of men move in the +same direction, though in a different place. They both move with the +order of the universe. They all know or feel this great ancient +truth:—"<i>Quod illi principi et præpotenti Deo qui omnem hunc mundum +regit nihil eorum quæ quidem fiant in terris acceptius quam concilia et +coetus hominum jure sociati quæ civitates appellantur</i>." They take this +tenet of the head and heart, not from the great name which it +immediately bears, nor from the greater from <a name="Page_361" id="Page_361" title="361" class="pagenum"></a>whence it is derived, but +from that which alone can give true weight and sanction to any learned +opinion, the common nature and common relation of men. Persuaded that +all things ought to be done with reference, and referring all to the +point of reference to which all should be directed, they think +themselves bound, not only as individuals in the sanctuary of the heart, +or as congregated in that personal capacity, to renew the memory of +their high origin and cast, but also in their corporate character to +perform their national homage to the Institutor and Author and Protector +of civil society, without which civil society man could not by any +possibility arrive at the perfection of which his nature is capable, nor +even make a remote and faint approach to it. They conceive that He who +gave our nature to be perfected by our virtue willed also the necessary +means of its perfection: He willed, therefore, the state: He willed its +connection with the source and original archetype of all perfection. +They who are convinced of this His will, which is the law of laws and +the sovereign of sovereigns, cannot think it reprehensible that this our +corporate fealty and homage, that this our recognition of a signiory +paramount, I had almost said this oblation of the state itself, as a +worthy offering on the high altar of universal praise, should be +performed, as all public, solemn acts are performed, in buildings, in +music, in decoration, in speech, in the dignity of persons, according to +the customs of mankind, taught by their nature,—that is, with modest +splendor, with unassuming state, with mild majesty and sober pomp. For +those purposes they think some part of the wealth of the country is as +usefully employed as it can be in fomenting the luxury of individuals. +It is the <a name="Page_362" id="Page_362" title="362" class="pagenum"></a>public ornament. It is the public consolation. It nourishes +the public hope. The poorest man finds his own importance and dignity in +it, whilst the wealth and pride of individuals at every moment makes the +man of humble rank and fortune sensible of his inferiority, and degrades +and vilifies his condition. It is for the man in humble life, and to +raise his nature, and to put him in mind of a state in which the +privileges of opulence will cease, when he will be equal by nature, and +may be more than equal by virtue, that this portion of the general +wealth of his country is employed and sanctified.</p> + +<p>I assure you I do not aim at singularity. I give you opinions which have +been accepted amongst us, from very early times to this moment, with a +continued and general approbation, and which, indeed, are so worked into +my mind that I am unable to distinguish what I have learned from others +from the results of my own meditation.</p> + +<p>It is on some such principles that the majority of the people of +England, far from thinking a religious national establishment unlawful, +hardly think it lawful to be without one. In France you are wholly +mistaken, if you do not believe us above all other things attached to +it, and beyond all other nations; and when this people has acted +unwisely and unjustifiably in its favor, (as in some instances they have +done, most certainly,) in their very errors you will at least discover +their zeal.</p> + +<p>This principle runs through the whole system of their polity. They do +not consider their Church establishment as convenient, but as essential +to their state: not as a thing heterogeneous and separable,—something +added for accommodation,—what they <a name="Page_363" id="Page_363" title="363" class="pagenum"></a>may either keep up or lay aside, +according to their temporary ideas of convenience. They consider it as +the foundation of their whole Constitution, with which, and with every +part of which, it holds an indissoluble union. Church and State are +ideas inseparable in their minds, and scarcely is the one ever mentioned +without mentioning the other.</p> + +<p>Our education is so formed as to confirm and fix this impression. Our +education is in a manner wholly in the hands of ecclesiastics, and in +all stages from infancy to manhood. Even when our youth, leaving schools +and universities, enter that most important period of life which begins +to link experience and study together, and when with that view they +visit other countries, instead of old domestics whom we have seen as +governors to principal men from other parts, three fourths of those who +go abroad with our young nobility and gentlemen are ecclesiastics: not +as austere masters, nor as mere followers; but as friends and companions +of a graver character, and not seldom persons as well born as +themselves. With them, as relations, they most commonly keep up a close +connection through life. By this connection we conceive that we attach +our gentlemen to the Church; and we liberalize the Church by an +intercourse with the leading characters of the country.</p> + +<p>So tenacious are we of the old ecclesiastical modes and fashions of +institution, that very little alteration has been made in them since the +fourteenth or fifteenth century: adhering in this particular, as in all +things else, to our old settled maxim, never entirely nor at once to +depart from antiquity. We found these old institutions, on the whole, +favorable to morality and discipline; and we thought they were +sus<a name="Page_364" id="Page_364" title="364" class="pagenum"></a>ceptible of amendment, without altering the ground. We thought that +they were capable of receiving and meliorating, and above all of +preserving, the accessions of science and literature, as the order of +Providence should successively produce them. And after all, with this +Gothic and monkish education, (for such it is in the groundwork,) we may +put in our claim to as ample and as early a share in all the +improvements in science, in arts, and in literature, which have +illuminated and adorned the modern world, as any other nation in Europe: +we think one main cause of this improvement was our not despising the +patrimony of knowledge which was left us by our forefathers.</p> + +<p>It is from our attachment to a Church establishment, that the English +nation did not think it wise to intrust that great fundamental interest +of the whole to what they trust no part of their civil or military +public service,—that is, to the unsteady and precarious contribution of +individuals. They go further. They certainly never have suffered, and +never will suffer, the fixed estate of the Church to be converted into a +pension, to depend on the Treasury, and to be delayed, withheld, or +perhaps to be extinguished by fiscal difficulties: which difficulties +may sometimes be pretended for political purposes, and are in fact often +brought on by the extravagance, negligence, and rapacity of politicians. +The people of England think that they have constitutional motives, as +well as religious, against any project of turning their independent +clergy into ecclesiastical pensioners of state. They tremble for their +liberty, from the influence of a clergy dependent on the crown; they +tremble for the public tranquillity, from the disorders of a <a name="Page_365" id="Page_365" title="365" class="pagenum"></a>factious +clergy, if it were made to depend upon any other than the crown. They +therefore made their Church, like their king and their nobility, +independent.</p> + +<p>From the united considerations of religion and constitutional policy, +from their opinion of a duty to make a sure provision for the +consolation of the feeble and the instruction of the ignorant, they have +incorporated and identified the estate of the Church with the mass of +<i>private property</i>, of which the state is not the proprietor, either for +use or dominion, but the guardian only and the regulator. They have +ordained that the provision of this establishment might be as stable as +the earth on which it stands, and should not fluctuate with the Euripus +of funds and actions.</p> + +<p>The men of England, the men, I mean, of light and leading in England, +whose wisdom (if they have any) is open and direct, would be ashamed, as +of a silly, deceitful trick, to profess any religion in name, which by +their proceedings they appear to contemn. If by their conduct (the only +language that rarely lies) they seemed to regard the great ruling +principle of the moral and the natural world as a mere invention to keep +the vulgar in obedience, they apprehend that by such a conduct they +would defeat the politic purpose they have in view. They would find it +difficult to make others believe in a system to which they manifestly +gave no credit themselves. The Christian statesmen of this land would, +indeed, first provide for the <i>multitude</i>, because it is the +<i>multitude</i>, and is therefore, as such, the first object in the +ecclesiastical institution, and in all institutions. They have been +taught that the circumstance of the Gospel's being <a name="Page_366" id="Page_366" title="366" class="pagenum"></a>preached to the poor +was one of the great tests of its true mission. They think, therefore, +that those do not believe it who do not take care it should be preached +to the poor. But as they know that charity is not confined to any one +description, but ought to apply itself to all men who have wants, they +are not deprived of a due and anxious sensation of pity to the +distresses of the miserable great. They are not repelled, through a +fastidious delicacy, at the stench of their arrogance and presumption, +from a medicinal attention to their mental blotches and running sores. +They are sensible that religious instruction is of more consequence to +them than to any others: from the greatness of the temptation to which +they are exposed; from the important consequences that attend their +faults; from the contagion of their ill example; from the necessity of +bowing down the stubborn neck of their pride and ambition to the yoke of +moderation and virtue; from a consideration of the fat stupidity and +gross ignorance concerning what imports men most to know, which prevails +at courts, and at the head of armies, and in senates, as much as at the +loom and in the field.</p> + +<p>The English people are satisfied, that to the great the consolations of +religion are as necessary as its instructions. They, too, are among the +unhappy. They feel personal pain and domestic sorrow. In these they have +no privilege, but are subject to pay their full contingent to the +contributions levied on mortality. They want this sovereign balm under +their gnawing cares and anxieties, which, being less conversant about +the limited wants of animal life, range without limit, and are +diversified by infinite combinations in the wild and unbounded regions +of <a name="Page_367" id="Page_367" title="367" class="pagenum"></a>imagination. Some charitable dole is wanting to these, our often +very unhappy brethren, to fill the gloomy void that reigns in minds +which have nothing on earth to hope or fear; something to relieve in the +killing languor and over-labored lassitude of those who have nothing to +do; something to excite an appetite to existence in the palled satiety +which attends on all pleasures which may be bought, where Nature is not +left to her own process, where even desire is anticipated, and therefore +fruition defeated by meditated schemes and contrivances of delight, and +no interval, no obstacle, is interposed between the wish and the +accomplishment.</p> + +<p>The people of England know how little influence the teachers of religion +are likely to have with the wealthy and powerful of long standing, and +how much less with the newly fortunate, if they appear in a manner no +way assorted to those with whom they must associate, and over whom they +must even exercise, in some cases, something like an authority. What +must they think of that body of teachers, if they see it in no part +above the establishment of their domestic servants? If the poverty were +voluntary, there might be some difference. Strong instances of +self-denial operate powerfully on our minds; and a man who has no wants +has obtained great freedom and firmness, and even dignity. But as the +mass of any description of men are but men, and their poverty cannot be +voluntary, that disrespect which attends upon all lay poverty will not +depart from the ecclesiastical. Our provident Constitution has therefore +taken care that those who are to instruct presumptuous ignorance, those +who are to be censors over insolent vice, should neither incur <a name="Page_368" id="Page_368" title="368" class="pagenum"></a>their +contempt nor live upon their alms; nor will it tempt the rich to a +neglect of the true medicine of their minds. For these reasons, whilst +we provide first for the poor, and with a parental solicitude, we have +not relegated religion (like something we were ashamed to show) to +obscure municipalities or rustic villages. No! we will have her to exalt +her mitred front in courts and parliaments. We will have her mixed +throughout the whole mass of life, and blended with all the classes of +society. The people of England will show to the haughty potentates of +the world, and to their talking sophisters, that a free, a generous, an +informed nation honors the high magistrates of its Church; that it will +not suffer the insolence of wealth and titles, or any other species of +proud pretension, to look down with scorn upon what they look up to with +reverence, nor presume to trample on that acquired personal nobility +which they intend always to be, and which often is, the fruit, not the +reward, (for what can be the reward?) of learning, piety, and virtue. +They can see, without pain or grudging, an archbishop precede a duke. +They can see a bishop of Durham or a bishop of Winchester in possession +of ten thousand pounds a year, and cannot conceive why it is in worse +hands than estates to the like amount in the hands of this earl or that +squire; although it may be true that so many dogs and horses are not +kept by the former, and fed with the victuals which ought to nourish the +children of the people. It is true, the whole Church revenue is not +always employed, and to every shilling, in charity; nor perhaps ought +it; but something is generally so employed. It is better to cherish +virtue and humanity, by leaving much to free <a name="Page_369" id="Page_369" title="369" class="pagenum"></a>will, even with some loss +to the object, than to attempt to make men mere machines and instruments +of a political benevolence. The world on the whole will gain by a +liberty without which virtue cannot exist.</p> + +<p>When once the commonwealth has established the estates of the Church as +property, it can consistently hear nothing of the more or the less. Too +much and too little are treason against property. What evil can arise +from the quantity in any hand, whilst the supreme authority has the +full, sovereign superintendence over this, as over any property, to +prevent every species of abuse,—and whenever it notably deviates, to +give to it a direction agreeable to the purposes of its institution?</p> + +<p>In England most of us conceive that it is envy and malignity towards +those who are often the beginners of their own fortune, and not a love +of the self-denial and mortification of the ancient Church, that makes +some look askance at the distinctions and honors and revenues which, +taken from no person, are set apart for virtue. The ears of the people +of England are distinguishing. They hear these men speak broad. Their +tongue betrays them. Their language is in the <i>patois</i> of fraud, in the +cant and gibberish of hypocrisy. The people of England must think so, +when these praters affect to carry back the clergy to that primitive +evangelic poverty which in the spirit ought always to exist in them, +(and in us, too, however we may like it,) but in the thing must be +varied, when the relation of that body to the state is altered,—when +manners, when modes of life, when indeed the whole order of human +affairs, has undergone a total revolution. We shall believe those +reformers to be <a name="Page_370" id="Page_370" title="370" class="pagenum"></a>then honest enthusiasts, not, as now we think them, +cheats and deceivers, when we see them throwing their own goods into +common, and submitting their own persons to the austere discipline of +the early Church.</p> + +<p>With these ideas rooted in their minds, the Commons of Great Britain, in +the national emergencies, will never seek their resource from the +confiscation of the estates of the Church and poor. Sacrilege and +proscription are not among the ways and means of our Committee of +Supply. The Jews in Change Alley have not yet dared to hint their hopes +of a mortgage on the revenues belonging to the see of Canterbury. I am +not afraid that I shall be disavowed, when I assure you that there is +not <i>one</i> public man in this kingdom, whom you wish to quote,—no, not +one, of any party or description,—who does not reprobate the dishonest, +perfidious, and cruel confiscation which the National Assembly has been +compelled to make of that property which it was their first duty to +protect.</p> + +<p>It is with the exultation of a little national pride I tell you that +those amongst us who have wished to pledge the societies of Paris in the +cup of their abominations have been disappointed. The robbery of your +Church has proved a security to the possessions of ours. It has roused +the people. They see with horror and alarm that enormous and shameless +act of proscription. It has opened, and will more and more open, their +eyes upon the selfish enlargement of mind and the narrow liberality of +sentiment of insidious men, which, commencing in close hypocrisy and +fraud, have ended in open violence and rapine. At home we behold similar +beginnings. We are on our guard against similar conclusions.<a name="Page_371" id="Page_371" title="371" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>I hope we shall never be so totally lost to all sense of the duties +imposed upon us by the law of social union, as, upon any pretest of +public service, to confiscate the goods of a single unoffending citizen. +Who but a tyrant (a name expressive of everything which can vitiate and +degrade human nature) could think of seizing on the property of men, +unaccused, unheard, untried, by whole descriptions, by hundreds and +thousands together? Who that had not lost every trace of humanity could +think of casting down men of exalted rank and sacred function, some of +them of an age to call at once for reverence and compassion,—of casting +them down from the highest situation in the commonwealth, wherein they +were maintained by their own landed property, to a state of indigence, +depression, and contempt?</p> + +<p>The confiscators truly have made some allowance to their victims from +the scraps and fragments of their own tables, from which they have been +so harshly driven, and which have been so bountifully spread for a feast +to the harpies of usury. But to drive men from independence to live on +alms is itself great cruelty. That which might be a tolerable condition +to men in one state of life, and not habituated to other things, may, +when all these circumstances are altered, be a dreadful revolution, and +one to which a virtuous mind would feel pain in condemning any guilt, +except that which would demand the life of the offender. But to many +minds this punishment of <i>degradation</i> and <i>infamy</i> is worse than death. +Undoubtedly it is an infinite aggravation of this cruel suffering, that +the persons who were taught a double prejudice in favor of religion, by +education, and by the place they held in the administration of its +func<a name="Page_372" id="Page_372" title="372" class="pagenum"></a>tions, are to receive the remnants of their property as alms from +the profane and impious hands of those who had plundered them of all the +rest,—to receive (if they are at all to receive) not from the +charitable contributions of the faithful, but from the insolent +tenderness of known and avowed atheism, the maintenance of religion, +measured out to them on the standard of the contempt in which it is +held, and for the purpose of rendering those who receive the allowance +vile and of no estimation in the eyes of mankind.</p> + +<p>But this act of seizure of property, it seems, is a judgment in law, and +not a confiscation. They have, it seems, found out in the academies of +the Palais Royal and the Jacobins, that certain men had no right to the +possessions which they held under law, usage, the decisions of courts, +and the accumulated prescription of a thousand years. They say that +ecclesiastics are fictitious persons, creatures of the state, whom at +pleasure they may destroy, and of course limit and modify in every +particular; that the goods they possess are not properly theirs, but +belong to the state which created the fiction; and we are therefore not +to trouble ourselves with what they may suffer in their natural feelings +and natural persons on account of what is done towards them in this +their constructive character. Of what import is it, under what names you +injure men, and deprive them of the just emoluments of a profession in +which they were not only permitted, but encouraged by the state to +engage, and upon the supposed certainty of which emoluments they had +formed the plan of their lives, contracted debts, and led multitudes to +an entire dependence upon them?<a name="Page_373" id="Page_373" title="373" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>You do not imagine, Sir, that I am going to compliment this miserable +distinction of persons with any long discussion. The arguments of +tyranny are as contemptible as its force is dreadful. Had not your +confiscators by their early crimes obtained a power which secures +indemnity to all the crimes of which they have since been guilty, or +that they can commit, it is not the syllogism of the logician, but the +lash of the executioner, that would have refuted a sophistry which +becomes an accomplice of theft and murder. The sophistic tyrants of +Paris are loud in their declamations against the departed regal tyrants +who in former ages have vexed the world. They are thus bold, because +they are safe from the dungeons and iron cages of their old masters. +Shall we be more tender of the tyrants of our own time, when we see them +acting worse tragedies under our eyes? Shall we not use the same liberty +that they do, when we can use it with the same safety, when to speak +honest truth only requires a contempt of the opinions of those whose +actions we abhor?</p> + +<p>This outrage on all the rights of property was at first covered with +what, on the system of their conduct, was the most astonishing of all +pretexts,—a regard to national faith. The enemies to property at first +pretended a most tender, delicate, and scrupulous anxiety for keeping +the king's engagements with the public creditor. These professors of the +rights of men are so busy in teaching others, that they have not leisure +to learn anything themselves; otherwise they would have known that it is +to the property of the citizen, and not to the demands of the creditor +of the state, that the first and original faith of civil society is +pledged. The claim of the citizen is prior in <a name="Page_374" id="Page_374" title="374" class="pagenum"></a>time, paramount in title, +superior in equity. The fortunes of individuals, whether possessed by +acquisition, or by descent, or in virtue of a participation in the goods +of some community, were no part of the creditor's security, expressed or +implied. They never so much as entered into his head, when he made his +bargain. He well knew that the public, whether represented by a monarch +or by a senate, can pledge nothing but the public estate; and it can +have no public estate, except in what it derives from a just and +proportioned imposition upon the citizens at large. This was engaged, +and nothing else could be engaged, to the public creditor. No man can +mortgage his injustice as a pawn for his fidelity.</p> + +<p>It is impossible to avoid some observation on the contradictions, caused +by the extreme rigor and the extreme laxity of this new public faith, +which influenced in this transaction, and which influenced not according +to the nature of the obligation, but to the description of the persons +to whom it was engaged. No acts of the old government of the kings of +France are held valid in the National Assembly, except its pecuniary +engagements: acts of all others of the most ambiguous legality. The rest +of the acts of that royal government are considered in so odious a light +that to have a claim under its authority is looked on as a sort of +crime. A pension, given as a reward for service to the state, is surely +as good a ground of property as any security for money advanced to the +state. It is a better; for money is paid, and well paid, to obtain that +service. We have, however, seen multitudes of people under this +description in France, who never had been deprived of their allowances +by the most arbitrary ministers in the most <a name="Page_375" id="Page_375" title="375" class="pagenum"></a>arbitrary times, by this +assembly of the rights of men robbed without mercy. They were told, in +answer to their claim to the bread earned with their blood, that their +services had not been rendered to the country that now exists.</p> + +<p>This laxity of public faith is not confined to those unfortunate +persons. The Assembly, with perfect consistency, it must be owned, is +engaged in a respectable deliberation how far it is bound by the +treaties made with other nations under the former government; and their +committee is to report which of them they ought to ratify, and which +not. By this means they have put the external fidelity of this virgin +state on a par with its internal.</p> + +<p>It is not easy to conceive upon what rational principle the royal +government should not, of the two, rather have possessed the power of +rewarding service and making treaties, in virtue of its prerogative, +than that of pledging to creditors the revenue of the state, actual and +possible. The treasure of the nation, of all things, has been the least +allowed to the prerogative of the king of France, or to the prerogative +of any king in Europe. To mortgage the public revenue implies the +sovereign dominion, in the fullest sense, over the public purse. It goes +far beyond the trust even of a temporary and occasional taxation. The +acts, however, of that dangerous power (the distinctive mark of a +boundless despotism) have been alone held sacred. Whence arose this +preference given by a democratic assembly to a body of property deriving +its title from the most critical and obnoxious of all the exertions of +monarchical authority? Reason can furnish nothing to reconcile +inconsistency; nor can partial favor be accounted for upon equita<a name="Page_376" id="Page_376" title="376" class="pagenum"></a>ble +principles. But the contradiction and partiality which admit no +justification are not the less without an adequate cause; and that cause +I do not think it difficult to discover.</p> + +<p>By the vast debt of France a great moneyed interest has insensibly grown +up, and with it a great power. By the ancient usages which prevailed in +that kingdom, the general circulation of property, and in particular the +mutual convertibility of land into money and of money into land, had +always been a matter of difficulty. Family settlements, rather more +general and more strict than they are in England, the <i>jus retractûs</i>, +the great mass of landed property held by the crown, and, by a maxim of +the French law, held unalienably, the vast estates of the ecclesiastic +corporations,—all these had kept the landed and moneyed interests more +separated in France, less miscible, and the owners of the two distinct +species of property not so well disposed to each other as they are in +this country.</p> + +<p>The moneyed property was long looked on with rather an evil eye by the +people. They saw it connected with their distresses, and aggravating +them. It was no less envied by the old landed interests,—partly for the +same reasons that rendered it obnoxious to the people, but much more so +as it eclipsed, by the splendor of an ostentatious luxury, the unendowed +pedigrees and naked titles of several among the nobility. Even when the +nobility, which represented the more permanent landed interest, united +themselves by marriage (which sometimes was the case) with the other +description, the wealth which saved the family from ruin was supposed to +contaminate and degrade it. Thus the enmities and heart <a name="Page_377" id="Page_377" title="377" class="pagenum"></a>burnings of +these parties were increased even by the usual means by which discord is +made to cease and quarrels are turned into friendship. In the mean time, +the pride of the wealthy men, not noble, or newly noble, increased with +its cause. They felt with resentment an inferiority the grounds of which +they did not acknowledge. There was no measure to which they were not +willing to lend themselves, in order to be revenged of the outrages of +this rival pride, and to exalt their wealth to what they considered as +its natural rank and estimation. They struck at the nobility through the +crown and the Church. They attacked them particularly on the side on +which they thought them the most vulnerable,—that is, the possessions +of the Church, which, through the patronage of the crown, generally +devolved upon the nobility. The bishoprics and the great commendatory +abbeys were, with few exceptions, held by that order.</p> + +<p>In this state of real, though not always perceived, warfare between the +noble ancient landed interest and the new moneyed interest, the +greatest, because the most applicable, strength was in the hands of the +latter. The moneyed interest is in its nature more ready for any +adventure, and its possessors more disposed to new enterprises of any +kind. Being of a recent acquisition, it falls in more naturally with any +novelties. It is therefore the kind of wealth which will be resorted to +by all who wish for change.</p> + +<p>Along with the moneyed interest, a new description of men had grown up, +with whom that interest soon formed a close and marked union: I mean the +political men of letters. Men of letters, fond of distinguishing +themselves, are rarely averse to innovation.<a name="Page_378" id="Page_378" title="378" class="pagenum"></a> Since the decline of the +life and greatness of Louis the Fourteenth, they were not so much +cultivated either by him, or by the Regent, or the successors to the +crown; nor were they engaged to the court by favors and emoluments so +systematically as during the splendid period of that ostentatious and +not impolitic reign. What they lost in the old court protection they +endeavored to make up by joining in a sort of incorporation of their +own; to which the two academies of France, and afterwards the vast +undertaking of the Encyclopædia, carried on by a society of these +gentlemen, did not a little contribute.</p> + +<p>The literary cabal had some years ago formed something like a regular +plan for the destruction of the Christian religion. This object they +pursued with a degree of zeal which hitherto had been discovered only in +the propagators of some system of piety. They were possessed with a +spirit of proselytism in the most fanatical degree,—and from thence, by +an easy progress, with the spirit of persecution according to their +means.<a name="FNanchor_97_98" id="FNanchor_97_98"></a><a href="#Footnote_97_98" class="fnanchor" title=" This (down to the end of the first sentence in the next +paragraph) and some other parts, here and there, were inserted, on his +reading the manuscript, by my lost son.">[97]</a> What was not to be done towards their great end by any direct +or immediate act might be wrought by a longer process through the medium +of opinion. To command that opinion, the first step is to establish a +dominion over those who direct it. They contrived to possess themselves, +with great method and perseverance, of all the avenues to literary fame. +Many of them, indeed, stood high in the ranks of literature and science. +The world had done them justice, and in favor of general talents forgave +the evil tendency of their peculiar principles.<a name="Page_379" id="Page_379" title="379" class="pagenum"></a> This was true +liberality; which they returned by endeavoring to confine the reputation +of sense, learning, and taste to themselves or their followers. I will +venture to say that this narrow, exclusive spirit has not been less +prejudicial to literature and to taste than to morals and true +philosophy. These atheistical fathers have a bigotry of their own; and +they have learnt to talk against monks with the spirit of a monk. But in +some things they are men of the world. The resources of intrigue are +called in to supply the defects of argument and wit. To this system of +literary monopoly was joined an unremitting industry to blacken and +discredit in every way, and by every means, all those who did not hold +to their faction. To those who have observed the spirit of their conduct +it has long been clear that nothing was wanted but the power of carrying +the intolerance of the tongue and of the pen into a persecution which +would strike at property, liberty, and life.</p> + +<p>The desultory and faint persecution carried on against them, more from +compliance with form and decency than with serious resentment, neither +weakened their strength nor relaxed their efforts. The issue of the +whole was, that, what with opposition, and what with success, a violent +and malignant zeal, of a kind hitherto unknown in the world, had taken +an entire possession of their minds, and rendered their whole +conversation, which otherwise would have been pleasing and instructive, +perfectly disgusting. A spirit of cabal, intrigue, and proselytism +pervaded all their thoughts, words, and actions. And as controversial +zeal soon turns its thoughts on force, they began to insinuate +themselves into a correspondence with foreign princes,—in hopes, +through their au<a name="Page_380" id="Page_380" title="380" class="pagenum"></a>thority, which at first they flattered, they might +bring about the changes they had in view. To them it was indifferent +whether these changes were to be accomplished by the thunderbolt of +despotism or by the earthquake of popular commotion. The correspondence +between this cabal and the late king of Prussia will throw no small +light upon the spirit of all their proceedings.<a name="FNanchor_98_99" id="FNanchor_98_99"></a><a href="#Footnote_98_99" class="fnanchor" title=" I do not choose to shock the feeling of the moral reader +with any quotation of their vulgar, base, and profane language.">[98]</a> For the same purpose +for which they intrigued with princes, they cultivated, in a +distinguished manner, the moneyed interest of France; and partly through +the means furnished by those whose peculiar offices gave them the most +extensive and certain means of communication, they carefully occupied +all the avenues to opinion.</p> + +<p>Writers, especially when they act in a body and with one direction, have +great influence on the public mind; the alliance, therefore, of these +writers with the moneyed interest<a name="FNanchor_99_100" id="FNanchor_99_100"></a><a href="#Footnote_99_100" class="fnanchor" title=" Their connection with Turgot and almost all the people of +the finance.">[99]</a> had no small effect in removing +the popular odium and envy which attended that species of wealth. These +writers, like the propagators of all novelties, pretended to a great +zeal for the poor and the lower orders, whilst in their satires they +rendered hateful, by every exaggeration, the faults of courts, of +nobility, and of priesthood. They became a sort of demagogues. They +served as a link to unite, in favor of one object, obnoxious wealth to +restless and desperate poverty.</p> + +<p>As these two kinds of men appear principal leaders in all the late +transactions, their junction and politics will serve to account, not +upon any principles of law or of policy, but as a <i>cause</i>, for the +general fury <a name="Page_381" id="Page_381" title="381" class="pagenum"></a>with which all the landed property of ecclesiastical +corporations has been attacked, and the great care which, contrary to +their pretended principles, has been taken of a moneyed interest +originating from the authority of the crown. All the envy against wealth +and power was artificially directed against other descriptions of +riches. On what other principle than that which I have stated can we +account for an appearance so extraordinary and unnatural as that of the +ecclesiastical possessions, which had stood so many successions of ages +and shocks of civil violences, and were guarded at once by justice and +by prejudice, being applied to the payment of debts comparatively +recent, invidious, and contracted by a decried and subverted government?</p> + +<p>Was the public estate a sufficient stake for the public debts? Assume +that it was not, and that a loss <i>must</i> be incurred somewhere. When the +only estate lawfully possessed, and which the contracting parties had in +contemplation at the time in which their bargain was made, happens to +fail, who, according to the principles of natural and legal equity, +ought to be the sufferer? Certainly it ought to be either the party who +trusted, or the party who persuaded him to trust, or both; and not third +parties who had no concern with the transaction. Upon any insolvency, +they ought to suffer who were weak enough to lend upon bad security, or +they who fraudulently held out a security that was not valid. Laws are +acquainted with no other rules of decision. But by the new institute of +the rights of men, the only persons who in equity ought to suffer are +the only persons who are to be saved harmless: those are to answer the +debt who neither were lenders nor borrowers, mortgagers nor mortgagees.<a name="Page_382" id="Page_382" title="382" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>What had the clergy to do with these transactions? What had they to do +with any public engagement further than the extent of their own debt? To +that, to be sure, their estates were bound to the last acre. Nothing can +lead more to the true spirit of the Assembly, which sits for public +confiscation with its new equity and its new morality, than an attention +to their proceeding with regard to this debt of the clergy. The body of +confiscators, true to that moneyed interest for which they were false to +every other, have found the clergy competent to incur a legal debt. Of +course they declared them legally entitled to the property which their +power of incurring the debt and mortgaging the estate implied: +recognizing the rights of those persecuted citizens in the very act in +which they were thus grossly violated.</p> + +<p>If, as I said, any persons are to mate good deficiencies to the public +creditor, besides the public at large, they must be those who managed +the agreement. Why, therefore, are not the estates of all the +comptrollers-general confiscated?<a name="FNanchor_100_101" id="FNanchor_100_101"></a><a href="#Footnote_100_101" class="fnanchor" title=" All have been confiscated in their turn.">[100]</a> Why not those of the long +succession of ministers, financiers, and bankers who have been enriched +whilst the nation was impoverished by their dealings and their counsels? +Why is not the estate of M. Laborde declared forfeited rather than of +the Archbishop of Paris, who has had nothing to do in the creation or in +the jobbing of the public funds? Or, if you must confiscate old landed +estates in favor of the money-jobbers, why is the penalty confined to +one description? I do not know whether the expenses of the Duke de +Choiseul have left anything of the infinite sums which he had derived +from the bounty of his master, during the <a name="Page_383" id="Page_383" title="383" class="pagenum"></a>transactions of a reign which +contributed largely, by every species of prodigality in war and peace, +to the present debt of France. If any such remains, why is not this +confiscated? I remember to have been in Paris during the time of the old +government. I was there just after the Duke d'Aiguillon had been +snatched (as it was generally thought) from the block by the hand of a +protecting despotism. He was a minister, and had some concern in the +affairs of that prodigal period. Why do I not see his estate delivered +up to the municipalities in which it is situated? The noble family of +Noailles have long been servants (meritorious servants I admit) to the +crown of France, and have had of course some share in its bounties. Why +do I hear nothing of the application of their estates to the public +debt? Why is the estate of the Duke de Rochefoucault more sacred than +that of the Cardinal de Rochefoucault? The former is, I doubt not, a +worthy person; and (if it were not a sort of profaneness to talk of the +use, as affecting the title to property) he makes a good use of his +revenues; but it is no disrespect to him to say, what authentic +information well warrants me in saying, that the use made of a property +equally valid, by his brother,<a name="FNanchor_101_102" id="FNanchor_101_102"></a><a href="#Footnote_101_102" class="fnanchor" title=" Not his brother, nor any near relation; but this mistake +does not affect the argument.">[101]</a> the Cardinal Archbishop of Rouen, +was far more laudable and far more public-spirited. Can one hear of the +proscription of such persons, and the confiscation of their effects, +without indignation, and horror? He is not a man who does not feel such +emotions on such occasions. He does not deserve the name of a free man +who will not express them.</p> + +<p>Few barbarous conquerors have ever made so ter<a name="Page_384" id="Page_384" title="384" class="pagenum"></a>rible a revolution in +property. None of the heads of the Roman factions, when they established +<i>crudelem illam hastam</i> in all their auctions of rapine, have ever set +up to sale the goods of the conquered citizen to such an enormous +amount. It must be allowed in favor of those tyrants of antiquity, that +what was done by them could hardly be said to be done in cold blood. +Their passions were inflamed, their tempers soured, their understandings +confused with the spirit of revenge, with the innumerable reciprocated +and recent inflictions and retaliations of blood and rapine. They were +driven beyond all bounds of moderation by the apprehension of the return +of power with the return of property to the families of those they had +injured beyond all hope of forgiveness.</p> + +<p>These Roman confiscators, who were yet only in the elements of tyranny, +and were not instructed in the rights of men to exercise all sorts of +cruelties on each other without provocation, thought it necessary to +spread a sort of color over their injustice. They considered the +vanquished party as composed of traitors, who had borne arms, or +otherwise had acted with hostility, against the commonwealth. They +regarded them as persons who had forfeited their property by their +crimes. With you, in your improved state of the human mind, there was no +such formality. You seized upon five millions sterling of annual rent, +and turned forty or fifty thousand human creatures out of their houses, +because "such was your pleasure." The tyrant Harry the Eighth of +England, as he was not better enlightened than the Roman Mariuses and +Syllas, and had not studied in your new schools, did not know what an +effectual instru<a name="Page_385" id="Page_385" title="385" class="pagenum"></a>ment of despotism was to be found in that grand +magazine of offensive weapons, the rights of men. When he resolved to +rob the abbeys, as the club of the Jacobins have robbed all the +ecclesiastics, he began by setting on foot a commission to examine into +the crimes and abuses which prevailed in those communities. As it might +be expected, his commission reported truths, exaggerations, and +falsehoods. But truly or falsely, it reported abuses and offences. +However, as abuses might be corrected, as every crime of persons does +not infer a forfeiture with regard to communities, and as property, in +that dark age, was not discovered to be a creature of prejudice, all +those abuses (and there were enough of them) were hardly thought +sufficient ground for such a confiscation as it was for his purposes to +make. He therefore procured the formal surrender of these estates. All +these operose proceedings were adopted by one of the most decided +tyrants in the rolls of history, as necessary preliminaries, before he +could venture, by bribing the members of his two servile Houses with a +share of the spoil, and holding out to them an eternal immunity from +taxation, to demand a confirmation of his iniquitous proceedings by an +act of Parliament. Had fate reserved him to our times, four technical +terms would have done his business, and saved him all this trouble; he +needed nothing more than one short form of incantation:—"<i>Philosophy, +Light, Liberality, the Rights of Men</i>."</p> + +<p>I can say nothing in praise of those acts of tyranny, which no voice has +hitherto ever commended under any of their false colors; yet in these +false colors an homage was paid by despotism to justice. The power which +was above all fear and all remorse was not set <a name="Page_386" id="Page_386" title="386" class="pagenum"></a>above all shame. Whilst +shame keeps its watch, virtue is not wholly extinguished in the heart, +nor will moderation be utterly exiled from the minds of tyrants.</p> + +<p>I believe every honest man sympathizes in his reflections with our +political poet on that occasion, and will pray to avert the omen, +whenever these acts of rapacious despotism present themselves to his +view or his imagination:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i9">"May no such storm<br /></span> +<span>Fall on our times, where rain must reform!<br /></span> +<span>Tell me, my Muse, what monstrous, dire offence,<br /></span> +<span>What crime could any Christian king incense<br /></span> +<span>To such a rage? Was't luxury, or lust<br /></span> +<span>Was <i>he</i> so temperate, so chaste, so just?<br /></span> +<span>Were these their crimes? They were his own much more:<br /></span> +<span>But wealth is crime enough to him that's poor."<a name="FNanchor_102_103" id="FNanchor_102_103"></a><a href="#Footnote_102_103" class="fnanchor" title=" The rest of the passage is this:— + + +"Who, having spent the treasures of his crown, +Condemns their luxury to feed his own. +And yet this act, to varnish o'er the shame +Of sacrilege, must bear Devotion's name. +No crime so bold, but would be understood +A Real, or at least a seeming good. +Who fears not to do ill, yet fears the name, +And free from conscience, is a slave to fame. +Thus he the Church at once protects and spoils: +But princes' swords are sharper than their styles. +And thus to th' ages past he makes amends, +Their charity destroys, their faith defends. +Then did Religion in a lazy cell, +In empty, airy contemplations, dwell; +And like the block, unmovèd lay: but ours, +As much too active, like the stork devours. +Is there no temperate region can be known +Betwixt their frigid and our torrid zone? +Could we not wake from that lethargic dream, +But to be restless in a worse extreme? +And for that lethargy was there no care, +But to be cast into a calenture? +Can knowledge have no bound, but must advance +So far, to make us wish for ignorance, +And rather in the dark to grope our way, +Than, led by a false guide, to err by day? +Who sees these dismal heaps, but would demand +What barbarous invader sack'd the land? +But when he hears no Goth, no Turk did bring +This desolation, but a Christian king, +When nothing but the name of zeal appears +'Twixt our best actions and the worst of theirs, +What does he think our sacrilege would spare, +When such th' effects of our devotions are?" + +_Cooper's Hill_, by Sir JOHN DENHAM.">[102]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>This same wealth, which is at all times treason and <i>lèze-nation</i> to +indigent and rapacious despotism, under all modes of polity, was your +temptation to <a name="Page_387" id="Page_387" title="387" class="pagenum"></a>violate property, law, and religion, united in one +object. But was the state of France so wretched and undone, that no +other resource but rapine remained to preserve its existence? On this +point I wish to receive some information. When the States met, was the +condition of the finances of France such, that, after economizing, on +principles of justice and mercy, through all departments, no fair +repartition of burdens upon all the orders could possibly restore them? +If such an equal imposition would have been sufficient, you well know it +might easily have been made. M. Necker, in the budget which he laid +before the orders assembled at Versailles, made a detailed exposition of +the state of the French nation.<a name="FNanchor_103_104" id="FNanchor_103_104"></a><a href="#Footnote_103_104" class="fnanchor" title=" Rapport de Mons. le Directeur-Général des Finances, fait +par Ordre du Roi à Versailles. Mai 5, 1789.">[103]</a></p> + +<p>If we give credit to him, it was not necessary to have recourse to any +new impositions whatsoever, to put the receipts of France on a balance +with its expenses. He stated the permanent charges of all descriptions, +including the interest of a new loan of four hundred millions, at +531,444,000 livres; the <a name="Page_388" id="Page_388" title="388" class="pagenum"></a>fixed revenue at 475,294,000: making the +deficiency 56,150,000, or short of 2,200,000 <i>l</i>. sterling. But to +balance it, he brought forward savings and improvements of revenue +(considered as entirely certain) to rather more than the amount of that +deficiency; and he concludes with these emphatical words (p. 39):—"Quel +pays, Messieurs, que celui, où, <i>sans impôts</i> et avec de simples objets +<i>inaperçus</i>, on peut faire disparoître un déficit qui a fait tant de +bruit en Europe!" As to the reimbursement, the sinking of debt, and the +other great objects of public credit and political arrangement indicated +in Monsieur Necker's speech, no doubt could be entertained but that a +very moderate and proportioned assessment on the citizens without +distinction would have provided for all of them to the fullest extent of +their demand.</p> + +<p>If this representation of M. Necker was false, then the Assembly are in +the highest degree culpable for having forced the king to accept as his +minister, and, since the king's deposition, for having employed as +<i>their</i> minister, a man who had been capable of abusing so notoriously +the confidence of his master and their own: in a matter, too, of the +highest moment, and directly appertaining to his particular office. But +if the representation was exact, (as, having always, along with you, +conceived a high degree of respect for M. Necker, I make no doubt it +was,) then what can be said in favor of those who, instead of moderate, +reasonable, and general contribution, have in cold blood, and impelled +by no necessity, had recourse to a partial and cruel confiscation?</p> + +<p>Was that contribution refused on a pretext of privilege, either on the +part of the clergy, or on that of the nobility? No, certainly. As to the +clergy, they <a name="Page_389" id="Page_389" title="389" class="pagenum"></a>even ran before the wishes of the third order. Previous to +the meeting of the States, they had in all their instructions expressly +directed their deputies to renounce every immunity which put them upon a +footing distinct from the condition of their fellow-subjects. In this +renunciation the clergy were even more explicit than the nobility.</p> + +<p>But let us suppose that the deficiency had remained at the fifty-six +millions, (or 2,200,000 <i>l</i>. sterling,) as at first stated by M. Necker. +Let us allow that all the resources he opposed to that deficiency were +impudent and groundless fictions, and that the Assembly (or their lords +of articles<a name="FNanchor_104_105" id="FNanchor_104_105"></a><a href="#Footnote_104_105" class="fnanchor" title=" In the Constitution of Scotland, during the Stuart +reigns, a committee sat for preparing bills; and none could pass, but +those previously approved by them. This committee was called Lords of +Articles.">[104]</a> at the Jacobins) were from thence justified in laying +the whole burden of that deficiency on the clergy,—yet allowing all +this, a necessity of 2,200,000 <i>l</i>. sterling will not support a +confiscation to the amount of five millions. The imposition of 2,200,000 +<i>l</i>. on the clergy, as partial, would have been oppressive and unjust, +but it would not have been altogether ruinous to those on whom it was +imposed; and therefore it would not have answered the real purpose of +the managers.</p> + +<p>Perhaps persons unacquainted with the state of France, on hearing the +clergy and the noblesse were privileged in point of taxation, may be led +to imagine, that, previous to the Revolution, these bodies had +contributed nothing to the state. This is a great mistake. They +certainly did not contribute equally with each other, nor either of them +equally with the <a name="Page_390" id="Page_390" title="390" class="pagenum"></a>commons. They both, however, contributed largely. +Neither nobility nor clergy enjoyed any exemption from the excise on +consumable commodities, from duties of custom, or from any of the other +numerous <i>indirect</i> impositions, which in France, as well as here, make +so very large a proportion of all payments to the public. The noblesse +paid the capitation. They paid also a land-tax, called the twentieth +penny, to the height sometimes of three, sometimes of four shillings in +the pound: both of them <i>direct</i> impositions, of no light nature, and no +trivial produce. The clergy of the provinces annexed by conquest to +France (which in extent make about an eighth part of the whole, but in +wealth a much larger proportion) paid likewise to the capitation and the +twentieth penny, at the rate paid by the nobility. The clergy in the old +provinces did not pay the capitation; but they had redeemed themselves +at the expense of about twenty-four millions, or a little more than a +million sterling. They were exempted from the twentieths: but then they +made free gifts; they contracted debts for the state; and they were +subject to some other charges, the whole computed at about a thirteenth +part of their clear income. They ought to have paid annually about forty +thousand pounds more, to put them on a par with the contribution of the +nobility.</p> + +<p>When the terrors of this tremendous proscription hung over the clergy, +they made an offer of a contribution, through the Archbishop of Aix, +which, for its extravagance, ought not to have been accepted. But it was +evidently and obviously more advantageous to the public creditor than +anything which could rationally be promised by the confiscation. Why was +<a name="Page_391" id="Page_391" title="391" class="pagenum"></a>it not accepted? The reason is plain:—There was no desire that the +Church should be brought to serve the State. The service of the State +was made a pretext to destroy the Church. In their way to the +destruction of the Church they would not scruple to destroy their +country: and they have destroyed it. One great end in the project would +have been defeated, if the plan of extortion had been adopted in lieu of +the scheme of confiscation. The new landed interest connected with the +new republic, and connected with it for its very being, could not have +been created. This was among the reasons why that extravagant ransom was +not accepted.</p> + +<p>The madness of the project of confiscation, on the plan that was first +pretended, soon became apparent. To bring this unwieldy mass of landed +property, enlarged by the confiscation of all the vast landed domain of +the crown, at once into market was obviously to defeat the profits +proposed by the confiscation, by depreciating the value of those lands, +and indeed of all the landed estates throughout France. Such a sudden +diversion of all its circulating money from trade to land must be an +additional mischief. What step was taken? Did the Assembly, on becoming +sensible of the inevitable ill effects of their projected sale, revert +to the offers of the clergy? No distress could oblige them to travel in +a course which was disgraced by any appearance of justice. Giving over +all hopes from a general immediate sale, another project seems to have +succeeded. They proposed to take stock in exchange for the Church lands. +In that project great difficulties arose in equalizing the objects to be +exchanged. Other obstacles also presented themselves, which threw them +back again upon some project of <a name="Page_392" id="Page_392" title="392" class="pagenum"></a>sale. The municipalities had taken an +alarm. They would not hear of transferring the whole plunder of the +kingdom to the stockholders in Paris. Many of those municipalities had +been (upon system) reduced to the most deplorable indigence. Money was +nowhere to be seen. They were therefore led to the point that was so +ardently desired. They panted for a currency of any kind which might +revive their perishing industry. The municipalities were, then, to be +admitted to a share in the spoil, which evidently rendered the first +scheme (if ever it had been seriously entertained) altogether +impracticable. Public exigencies pressed upon all sides. The Minister of +Finance reiterated his call for supply with, a most urgent, anxious, and +boding voice. Thus pressed on all sides, instead of the first plan of +converting their bankers into bishops and abbots, instead of paying the +old debt, they contracted a new debt, at three per cent, creating a new +paper currency, founded on an eventual sale of the Church lands. They +issued this paper currency to satisfy in the first instance chiefly the +demands made upon them by the <i>bank of discount</i>, the great machine or +paper-mill of their fictitious wealth.</p> + +<p>The spoil of the Church was now become the only resource of all their +operations in finance, the vital principle of all their politics, the +sole security for the existence of their power. It was necessary, by +all, even the most violent means, to put every individual on the same +bottom, and to bind the nation in one guilty interest to uphold this +act, and the authority of those by whom it was done. In order to force +the most reluctant into a participation of their pillage, they rendered +their paper circulation compulsory in <a name="Page_393" id="Page_393" title="393" class="pagenum"></a>all payments. Those who consider +the general tendency of their schemes to this one object as a centre, +and a centre from which afterwards all their measures radiate, will not +think that I dwell too long upon this part of the proceedings of the +National Assembly.</p> + +<p>To cut off all appearance of connection between the crown and public +justice, and to bring the whole under implicit obedience to the +dictators in Paris, the old independent judicature of the Parliaments, +with all its merits and all its faults, was wholly abolished. Whilst the +Parliaments existed, it was evident that the people might some time or +other come to resort to them, and rally under the standard of their +ancient laws. It became, however, a matter of consideration, that the +magistrates and officers in the courts now abolished <i>had purchased +their places</i> at a very high rate, for which, as well as for the duty +they performed, they received but a very low return of interest. Simple +confiscation is a boon only for the clergy: to the lawyers some +appearances of equity are to be observed; and they are to receive +compensation to an immense amount. Their compensation becomes part of +the national debt, for the liquidation of which there is the one +exhaustless fund. The lawyers are to obtain their compensation in the +new Church paper, which is to march with the new principles of +judicature and legislature. The dismissed magistrates are to take their +share of martyrdom with the ecclesiastics, or to receive their own +property from such a fund and in such a manner as all those who have +been seasoned with the ancient principles of jurisprudence, and had been +the sworn guardians of property, must look upon with horror.<a name="Page_394" id="Page_394" title="394" class="pagenum"></a> Even the +clergy are to receive their miserable allowance out of the depreciated +paper, which is stamped with the indelible character of sacrilege, and +with the symbols of their own ruin, or they must starve. So violent an +outrage upon credit, property, and liberty, as this compulsory paper +currency, has seldom been exhibited by the alliance of bankruptcy and +tyranny, at any time, or in any nation.</p> + +<p>In the course of all these operations, at length comes out the grand +<i>arcanum</i>,—that in reality, and in a fair sense, the lands of the +Church (so far as anything certain can be gathered from their +proceedings) are not to be sold at all. By the late resolutions of the +National Assembly, they are, indeed, to be delivered to the highest +bidder. But it is to be observed, that <i>a certain portion only of the +purchase-money is to be laid down</i>. A period of twelve years is to be +given for the payment of the rest. The philosophic purchasers are +therefore, on payment of a sort of fine, to be put instantly into +possession of the estate. It becomes in some respects a sort of gift to +them,—to be held on the feudal tenure of zeal to the new establishment. +This project is evidently to let in a body of purchasers without money. +The consequence will be, that these purchasers, or rather grantees, will +pay, not only from the rents as they accrue, which might as well be +received by the state, but from the spoil of the materials of buildings, +from waste in woods, and from whatever money, by hands habituated to the +gripings of usury, they can wring from the miserable peasant. He is to +be delivered over to the mercenary and arbitrary discretion of men who +will be stimulated to every species of extortion by the growing demands +on the growing prof<a name="Page_395" id="Page_395" title="395" class="pagenum"></a>its of an estate held under the precarious +settlement of a new political system.</p> + +<p>When all the frauds, impostures, violences, rapines, burnings, murders, +confiscations, compulsory paper currencies, and every description of +tyranny and cruelty employed to bring about and to uphold this +Revolution have their natural effect, that is, to shock the moral +sentiments of all virtuous and sober minds, the abettors of this +philosophic system immediately strain their throats in a declamation +against the old monarchical government of France. When they have +rendered that deposed power sufficiently black, they then proceed in +argument, as if all those who disapprove of their new abuses must of +course be partisans of the old,—that those who reprobate their crude +and violent schemes of liberty ought to be treated as advocates for +servitude. I admit that their necessities do compel them to this base +and contemptible fraud. Nothing can reconcile men to their proceedings +and projects but the supposition that there is no third option between +them and some tyranny as odious as can be furnished by the records of +history or by the invention of poets. This prattling of theirs hardly +deserves the name of sophistry. It is nothing but plain impudence. Have +these gentlemen never heard, in the whole circle of the worlds of theory +and practice, of anything between the despotism of the monarch and the +despotism of the multitude? Have they never heard of a monarchy directed +by laws, controlled and balanced by the great hereditary wealth and +hereditary dignity of a nation, and both again controlled by a judicious +check from the reason and feeling of the people at large, acting by a +suitable and permanent organ? Is it, then, impossi<a name="Page_396" id="Page_396" title="396" class="pagenum"></a>ble that a man may be +found who, without criminal ill intention or pitiable absurdity, shall +prefer such a mixed and tempered government to either of the +extremes,—and who may repute that nation to be destitute of all wisdom +and of all virtue, which, having in its choice to obtain such a +government with ease, <i>or rather to confirm it when actually possessed</i>, +thought proper to commit a thousand crimes, and to subject their country +to a thousand evils, in order to avoid it? Is it, then, a truth so +universally acknowledged, that a pure democracy is the only tolerable +form into which human society can be thrown, that a man is not permitted +to hesitate about its merits, without the suspicion of being a friend to +tyranny, that is, of being a foe to mankind?</p> + +<p>I do not know under what description to class the present ruling +authority in France. It affects to be a pure democracy, though I think +it in a direct train of becoming shortly a mischievous and ignoble +oligarchy. But for the present I admit it to be a contrivance of the +nature and effect of what it pretends to. I reprobate no form of +government merely upon abstract principles. There may be situations in +which the purely democratic form will become necessary. There may be +some (very few, and very particularly circumstanced) where it would be +clearly desirable. This I do not take to be the case of France, or of +any other great country. Until now, we have seen no examples of +considerable democracies. The ancients were better acquainted with them. +Not being wholly unread in the authors who had seen the most of those +constitutions, and who best understood them, I cannot help concurring +with their opinion, that an absolute democracy no more than absolute +monarchy <a name="Page_397" id="Page_397" title="397" class="pagenum"></a>is to be reckoned among the legitimate forms of government. +They think it rather the corruption and degeneracy than the sound +constitution of a republic. If I recollect rightly, Aristotle observes, +that a democracy has many striking points of resemblance with a +tyranny.<a name="FNanchor_105_106" id="FNanchor_105_106"></a><a href="#Footnote_105_106" class="fnanchor" title=" When I wrote this I quoted from memory, after many years +had elapsed from my reading the passage. A learned friend has found it +and it is as follows:— + +τὸ ἠ̂θος τὸ αὐτό, καὶ ἄμφω δεσποτικὰ τω̂ν βελτιόνων, καὶ τὰ +ψηφίσματα ὥσπερ ἐκει̂ τὰ ἐπιτάγματα, καὶ ὁ δημαγωγὸς καὶ ὁ +κόλαξ οἱ αὐτοὶ καὶ ἀνάλογον. καὶ μάλιστα δ' ἑκάτεροι παρ' +ἑκατέροις ἰσχύουσιν, οἱ μὲν κόλακες παρὰ τοι̂ς τυράννοις, οἱ +δὲ δημαγωγοὶ παρὰ τοι̂ς δήμοις τοι̂ς τοιούτοις. + +"The ethical character is the same: both exercise despotism over the +better class of citizens; and decrees are in the one what ordinances and +arrêts are in the other: the demagogue, too, and the court favorite, are +not unfrequently the same identical men, and always bear a close +analogy; and these have the principal power, each in their respective +forms of government, favorites with the absolute monarch, and demagogues +with a people such as I have described."—Arist. Politic. lib. iv. cap. +4.">[105]</a> Of this I am certain, that in a democracy the majority of +the citizens is capable of exercising the most cruel oppressions upon +the minority, whenever strong divisions prevail in that kind of polity, +as they often must,—and that oppression of the minority will extend to +far greater numbers, and will be carried on with much greater fury, than +can almost ever be apprehended from the dominion of a single sceptre. In +such a popular persecution, individual sufferers are in a much more +deplorable condition than in any other. Under a cruel prince they have +the balmy compassion of mankind to assuage the smart of their wounds, +they have the plaudits of the people to animate their generous constancy +under their sufferings: but those who are subjected to wrong under +multitudes are deprived of all external conso<a name="Page_398" id="Page_398" title="398" class="pagenum"></a>lation; they seem deserted +by mankind, overpowered by a conspiracy of their whole species.</p> + +<p>But admitting democracy not to have that inevitable tendency to party +tyranny which I suppose it to have, and admitting it to possess as much +good in it when unmixed as I am sure it possesses when compounded with +other forms; does monarchy, on its part, contain nothing at all to +recommend it? I do not often quote Bolingbroke, nor have his works in +general left any permanent impression on my mind. He is a presumptuous +and a superficial writer. But he has one observation which in my opinion +is not without depth and solidity. He says that he prefers a monarchy to +other governments, because you can better ingraft any description of +republic on a monarchy than anything of monarchy upon the republican +forms. I think him perfectly in the right. The fact is so historically, +and it agrees well with the speculation.</p> + +<p>I know how easy a topic it is to dwell on the faults of departed +greatness. By a revolution in the state, the fawning sycophant of +yesterday is converted into the austere critic of the present hour. But +steady, independent minds, when they have an object of so serious a +concern to mankind as government under their contemplation, will disdain +to assume the part of satirists and declaimers. They will judge of human +institutions as they do of human characters. They will sort out the good +from the evil, which is mixed in mortal institutions as it is in mortal +men.</p> + +<p>Your government in France, though usually, and I think justly, reputed +the best of the unqualified or ill-qualified monarchies, was still full +of abuses.<a name="Page_399" id="Page_399" title="399" class="pagenum"></a> These abuses accumulated in a length of time, as they must +accumulate in every monarchy not under the constant inspection of a +popular representative. I am no stranger to the faults and defects of +the subverted government of France; and I think I am not inclined by +nature or policy to make a panegyric upon anything which is a just and +natural object of censure. But the question is not now of the vices of +that monarchy, but of its existence. Is it, then, true, that the French +government was such as to be incapable or undeserving of reform, so that +it was of absolute necessity the whole fabric should be at once pulled +down, and the area cleared for the erection of a theoretic, experimental +edifice in its place? All France was of a different opinion in the +beginning of the year 1789. The instructions to the representatives to +the States-General, from every district in that kingdom, were filled +with projects for the reformation of that government, without the +remotest suggestion of a design to destroy it. Had such a design been +then even insinuated, I believe there would have been but one voice, and +that voice for rejecting it with scorn and horror. Men have been +sometimes led by degrees, sometimes hurried, into things of which, if +they could have seen the whole together, they never would have permitted +the most remote approach. When those instructions were given, there was +no question but that abuses existed, and that they demanded a reform: +nor is there now. In the interval between the instructions and the +Revolution things changed their shape; and in consequence of that +change, the true question at present is, whether those who would have +reformed or those who have destroyed are in the right.<a name="Page_400" id="Page_400" title="400" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>To hear some men speak of the late monarchy of France, you would imagine +that they were talking of Persia bleeding under the ferocious sword of +Thamas Kouli Khân,—or at least describing the barbarous anarchic +despotism of Turkey, where the finest countries in the most genial +climates in the world are wasted by peace more than any countries have +been worried by war, where arts are unknown, where manufactures +languish, where science is extinguished, where agriculture decays, where +the human race itself melts away and perishes under the eye of the +observer. Was this the case of France? I have no way of determining the +question but by a reference to facts. Facts do not support this +resemblance. Along with much evil, there is some good in monarchy +itself; and some corrective to its evil from religion, from laws, from +manners, from opinions, the French monarchy must have received, which +rendered it (though by no means a free, and therefore by no means a good +constitution) a despotism rather in appearance than in reality.</p> + +<p>Among the standards upon which the effects of government on any country +are to be estimated, I must consider the state of its population as not +the least certain. No country in which population flourishes, and is in +progressive improvement, can be under a <i>very</i> mischievous government. +About sixty years ago, the Intendants of the Generalities of France +made, with other matters, a report of the population of their several +districts. I have not the books, which are very voluminous, by me, nor +do I know where to procure them, (I am obliged to speak by memory, and +therefore the less positively,) but I think the population of France was +by them, even at that pe<a name="Page_401" id="Page_401" title="401" class="pagenum"></a>riod, estimated at twenty-two millions of +souls. At the end of the last century it had been generally calculated +at eighteen. On either of these estimations, France was not ill-peopled. +M. Necker, who is an authority for his own time at least equal to the +Intendants for theirs, reckons, and upon apparently sure principles, the +people of France, in the year 1780, at twenty-four millions six hundred +and seventy thousand. But was this the probable ultimate term under the +old establishment? Dr. Price is of opinion that the growth of population +in France was by no means at its acme in that year. I certainly defer to +Dr. Price's authority a good deal more in these speculations than I do +in his general politics. This gentleman, taking ground on M. Necker's +data, is very confident that since the period of that minister's +calculation the French population has increased rapidly,—so rapidly, +that in the year 1789 he will not consent to rate the people of that +kingdom at a lower number than thirty millions. After abating much (and +much I think ought to be abated) from the sanguine calculation of Dr. +Price, I have no doubt that the population of France did increase +considerably during this latter period: but supposing that it increased +to nothing more than will be sufficient to complete the twenty-four +millions six hundred and seventy thousand to twenty-five millions, still +a population of twenty-five millions, and that in an increasing +progress, on a space of about twenty-seven thousand square leagues, is +immense. It is, for instance, a good deal more than the proportionable +population of this island, or even than that of England, the best +peopled part of the United Kingdom.<a name="Page_402" id="Page_402" title="402" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>It is not universally true that France is a fertile country. +Considerable tracts of it are barren, and labor under other natural +disadvantages. In the portions of that territory where things are more +favorable, as far as I am able to discover, the numbers of the people +correspond to the indulgence of Nature.<a name="FNanchor_106_107" id="FNanchor_106_107"></a><a href="#Footnote_106_107" class="fnanchor" title=" De l'Administration des Finances de la France, par Mons. +Necker, Vol. I. p. 288.">[106]</a> The Generality of Lisle, +(this I admit is the strongest example,) upon an extent of four hundred +and four leagues and a half, about ten years ago contained seven hundred +and thirty-four thousand six hundred souls, which is one thousand seven +hundred and seventy-two inhabitants to each square league. The middle +term for the rest of France is about nine hundred inhabitants to the +same admeasurement.</p> + +<p>I do not attribute this population to the deposed government; because I +do not like to compliment the contrivances of men with what is due in a +great degree to the bounty of Providence. But that decried government +could not have obstructed, most probably it favored, the operation of +those causes, (whatever they were,) whether of Nature in the soil, or +habits of industry among the people, which has produced so large a +number of the species throughout that whole kingdom, and exhibited in +some particular places such prodigies of population. I never will +suppose that fabric of a state to be the worst of all political +institutions which by experience is found to contain a principle +favorable (however latent it may be) to the increase of mankind.</p> + +<p>The wealth of a country is another, and no contemptible standard, by +which we may judge whether, on the whole, a government be protecting or +destruc<a name="Page_403" id="Page_403" title="403" class="pagenum"></a>tive. France far exceeds England in the multitude of her people; +but I apprehend that her comparative wealth is much inferior to +ours,—that it is not so equal in the distribution, nor so ready in the +circulation. I believe the difference in the form of the two governments +to be amongst the causes of this advantage on the side of England: I +speak of England, not of the whole British dominions,—which, if +compared with those of France, will in some degree weaken the +comparative rate of wealth upon our side. But that wealth, which will +not endure a comparison with the riches of England, may constitute a +very respectable degree of opulence. M. Necker's book, published in +1785,<a name="FNanchor_107_108" id="FNanchor_107_108"></a><a href="#Footnote_107_108" class="fnanchor" title=" De l'Administration des Finances de la France, par M. +Necker.">[107]</a> contains an accurate and interesting collection of facts +relative to public economy and to political arithmetic; and his +speculations on the subject are in general wise and liberal. In that +work he gives an idea of the state of France, very remote from the +portrait of a country whose government was a perfect grievance, an +absolute evil, admitting no cure but through the violent and uncertain +remedy of a total revolution. He affirms, that from the year 1726 to the +year 1784 there was coined at the mint of France, in the species of gold +and silver, to the amount of about one hundred millions of pounds +sterling.<a name="FNanchor_108_109" id="FNanchor_108_109"></a><a href="#Footnote_108_109" class="fnanchor" title=" Vol. III. chap. 8 and chap. 9.">[108]</a></p> + +<p>It is impossible that M. Necker should be mistaken in the amount of the +bullion which has been coined in the mint. It is a matter of official +record. The reasonings of this able financier concerning the quantity of +gold and silver which remained for circulation, when he wrote in 1785, +that is, about <a name="Page_404" id="Page_404" title="404" class="pagenum"></a>four years before the deposition and imprisonment of the +French king, are not of equal certainty; but they are laid on grounds so +apparently solid, that it is not easy to refuse a considerable degree of +assent to his calculation. He calculates the <i>numéraire</i>, or what we +call <i>specie</i>, then actually existing in France, at about eighty-eight +millions of the same English money. A great accumulation of wealth for +one country, large as that country is! M. Necker was so far from +considering this influx of wealth as likely to cease, when he wrote in +1785, that he presumes upon a future annual increase of two per cent +upon the money brought into France during the periods from which he +computed.</p> + +<p>Some adequate cause must have originally introduced all the money coined +at its mint into that kingdom; and some cause as operative must have +kept at home, or returned into its bosom, such a vast flood of treasure +as M. Necker calculates to remain for domestic circulation. Suppose any +reasonable deductions from M. Necker's computation, the remainder must +still amount to an immense sum. Causes thus powerful to acquire and to +retain cannot be found in discouraged industry, insecure property, and a +positively destructive government. Indeed, when I consider the face of +the kingdom of France, the multitude and opulence of her cities, the +useful magnificence of her spacious high-roads and bridges, the +opportunity of her artificial canals and navigations opening the +conveniences of maritime communication through a solid continent of so +immense an extent,—when I turn my eyes to the stupendous works of her +ports and harbors, and to her whole naval apparatus, whether for war or +trade,—when I bring before my <a name="Page_405" id="Page_405" title="405" class="pagenum"></a>view the number of her fortifications, +constructed with so bold and masterly a skill, and made and maintained +at so prodigious a charge, presenting an armed front and impenetrable +barrier to her enemies upon every side,—when I recollect how very small +a part of that extensive region is without cultivation, and to what +complete perfection the culture of many of the best productions of the +earth have been brought in France,—when I reflect on the excellence of +her manufactures and fabrics, second to none but ours, and in some +particulars not second,—when I contemplate the grand foundations of +charity, public and private,—when I survey the state of all the arts +that beautify and polish life,—when I reckon the men she has bled for +extending her fame in war, her able statesmen, the multitude of her +profound lawyers and theologians, her philosophers, her critics, her +historians and antiquaries, her poets and her orators, sacred and +profane,—I behold in all this something which awes and commands the +imagination, which checks the mind on the brink of precipitate and +indiscriminate censure, and which demands that we should very seriously +examine what and how great are the latent vices that could authorize us +at once to level so spacious a fabric with the ground. I do not +recognize in this view of things the despotism of Turkey. Nor do I +discern the character of a government that has been on the whole so +oppressive, or so corrupt, or so negligent, as to be utterly unfit <i>for +all reformation</i>. I must think such a government well deserved to have +its excellences heightened, its faults corrected, and its capacities +improved into a British Constitution.</p> + +<p>Whoever has examined into the proceedings of that <a name="Page_406" id="Page_406" title="406" class="pagenum"></a>deposed government +for several years back cannot fail to have observed, amidst the +inconstancy and fluctuation natural to courts, an earnest endeavor +towards the prosperity and improvement of the country; he must admit +that it had long been employed, in some instances wholly to remove, in +many considerably to correct, the abusive practices and usages that had +prevailed in the state,—and that even the unlimited power of the +sovereign over the persons of his subjects, inconsistent, as undoubtedly +it was, with law and liberty, had yet been every day growing more +mitigated in the exercise. So far from refusing itself to reformation, +that government was open, with a censurable degree of facility, to all +sorts of projects and projectors on the subject. Rather too much +countenance was given to the spirit of innovation, which soon was turned +against those who fostered it, and ended in their ruin. It is but cold, +and no very flattering justice to that fallen monarchy, to say, that, +for many years, it trespassed more by levity and want of judgment in +several of its schemes than from any defect in diligence or in public +spirit. To compare the government of France for the last fifteen or +sixteen years with wise and well-constituted establishments during that, +or during any period, is not to act with fairness. But if in point of +prodigality in the expenditure of money, or in point of rigor in the +exercise of power, it be compared with any of the former reigns, I +believe candid judges will give little credit to the good intentions of +those who dwell perpetually on the donations to favorites, or on the +expenses of the court, or on the horrors of the Bastile, in the reign of +Louis the Sixteenth.<a name="FNanchor_109_110" id="FNanchor_109_110"></a><a href="#Footnote_109_110" class="fnanchor" title=" The world is obliged to M. de Calonne for the pains he +has taken to refute the scandalous exaggerations relative to some of the +royal expenses, and to detect the fallacious account given of pensions, +for the wicked purpose of provoking the populace to all sorts of +crimes.">[109]</a><a name="Page_407" id="Page_407" title="407" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>Whether the system, if it deserves such a name, now built on the ruins +of that ancient monarchy, will be able to give a better account of the +population and wealth of the country which it has taken under its care, +is a matter very doubtful. Instead of improving by the change, I +apprehend that a long series of years must be told, before it can +recover in any degree the effects of this philosophic Revolution, and +before the nation can be replaced on its former footing. If Dr. Price +should think fit, a few years hence, to favor us with an estimate of the +population of France, he will hardly be able to make up his tale of +thirty millions of souls, as computed in 1789, or the Assembly's +computation of twenty-six millions of that year, or even M. Necker's +twenty-five millions in 1780. I hear that there are considerable +emigrations from France,—and that many, quitting that voluptuous +climate, and that seductive Circean liberty, have taken refuge in the +frozen regions and under the British despotism of Canada.</p> + +<p>In the present disappearance of coin, no person could think it the same +country in which the present minister of the finances has been able to +discover fourscore millions sterling in specie. From its general aspect +one would conclude that it had been for some time past under the special +direction of the learned academicians of Laputa and Balnibarbi.<a name="FNanchor_110_111" id="FNanchor_110_111"></a><a href="#Footnote_110_111" class="fnanchor" title=" See Gulliver's Travels for the idea of countries governed +by philosophers.">[110]</a> +Already the population of Paris has so declined, that M. Necker stated +to the National Assembly the pro<a name="Page_408" id="Page_408" title="408" class="pagenum"></a>vision to be made for its subsistence +at a fifth less than what had formerly been found requisite.<a name="FNanchor_111_112" id="FNanchor_111_112"></a><a href="#Footnote_111_112" class="fnanchor" title=" M. de Calonne states the falling off of the population of +Paris as far more considerable; and it may be so, since the period of M. +Necker's calculation.">[111]</a> It is +said (and I have never heard it contradicted) that a hundred thousand +people are out of employment in that city, though it is become the seat +of the imprisoned court and National Assembly. Nothing, I am credibly +informed, can exceed the shocking and disgusting spectacle of mendicancy +displayed in that capital. Indeed, the votes of the National Assembly +leave no doubt of the fact. They have lately appointed a standing +committee of mendicancy. They are contriving at once a vigorous police +on this subject, and, for the first time, the imposition of a tax to +maintain the poor, for whoso present relief great sums appear on the +face of the public accounts of the year.<a name="FNanchor_112_113" id="FNanchor_112_113"></a><a href="#Footnote_112_113" class="fnanchor" title=" + +Travaux de charité pour subvenir +au manque de travail à Livres. £ s. d. +Paris et dans les provinces 3,866,920 161,121 13 4 +Destruction de vagabondage et de la +mendicité 1,671,417 69,642 7 6 +Primes pour l'importation de grains 5,671,907 235,329 9 2 +Dépenses relatives aux subsistances, +déduction fait des reconvrements +qui out en lieu 39,871,790 1,661,324 11 8 +Total 51,082,034 2,128,418 1 8 + + +When I sent this book to the press, I entertained some doubt concerning +the nature and extent of the last article in the above accounts, which +is only under a general head, without any detail. Since then I have seen +M. de Calonne's work. I must think it a great loss to me that I had not +that advantage earlier. M. de Calonne thinks this article to be on +account of general subsistence; but as he is not able to comprehend how +so great a loss as upwards of 1,661,000_l._ sterling could be sustained +on the difference between the price and the sale of grain, he seems to +attribute this enormous head of charge to secret expenses of the +Revolution. I cannot say anything positively on that subject. The reader +is capable of judging, by the aggregate of these immense charges, on the +state and condition of France, and the system of public economy adopted +in that nation. These articles of account produced no inquiry or +discussion in the National Assembly.">[112]</a> In the mean time the +leaders of the legislative clubs and coffee-houses are intoxicated with +admiration at their own wisdom and ability. They speak with the most +sovereign contempt of the rest of the world. They toll the people, to +comfort them in the rags with which they have clothed them, that they +are a nation of philosophers; and sometimes, by all the arts of +<a name="Page_409" id="Page_409" title="409" class="pagenum"></a>quackish parade, by show, tumult, and bustle, sometimes by the alarms +of plots and invasions, they attempt to drown the cries of indigence, +and to divert the eyes of the observer from the ruin and wretchedness of +the state. A brave people will certainly prefer liberty accompanied with +a virtuous poverty to a depraved and wealthy servitude. But before the +price of comfort and opulence is paid, one ought to be pretty sure it is +real liberty which is purchased, and that she is to be purchased at no +other price. I shall always, however, consider that liberty as very +equivocal in her appearance, which has not wisdom and justice for her +companions, and does not lead prosperity and plenty in her train.</p> + +<p>The advocates for this Revolution, not satisfied with exaggerating the +vices of their ancient government, strike at the fame of their country +itself, by painting almost all that could have attracted the attention +of strangers, I mean their nobility and their clergy, as objects of +horror. If this were only a libel, there had not been much in it. But it +has practical consequences. Had your nobility and gentry, who <a name="Page_410" id="Page_410" title="410" class="pagenum"></a>formed +the great body of your landed men and the whole of your military +officers, resembled those of Germany, at the period when the Hanse towns +were necessitated to confederate against the nobles in defence of their +property,—had they been like the Orsini and Vitelli in Italy, who used +to sally from their fortified dens to rob the trader and traveller,—had +they been such as the Mamelukes in Egypt, or the Nayres on the coast of +Malabar,—I do admit that too critical an inquiry might not be advisable +into the means of freeing the world from such a nuisance. The statues of +Equity and Mercy might be veiled for a moment. The tenderest minds, +confounded with the dreadful exigence in which morality submits to the +suspension of its own rules in favor of its own principles, might turn +aside whilst fraud and violence were accomplishing the destruction of a +pretended nobility, which disgraced, whilst it persecuted, human nature. +The persons most abhorrent from blood and treason and arbitrary +confiscation might remain silent spectators of this civil war between +the vices.</p> + +<p>But did the privileged nobility who met under the king's precept at +Versailles in 1789, or their constituents, deserve to be looked on as +the Nayres or Mamelukes of this age, or as the Orsini and Vitelli of +ancient times? If I had then asked the question, I should have passed +for a madman. What have they since done, that they were to be driven +into exile, that their persons should be hunted about, mangled, and +tortured, their families dispersed, their houses laid in ashes, and that +their order should be abolished, and the memory of it, if possible, +extinguished, by ordaining them to change the very names by <a name="Page_411" id="Page_411" title="411" class="pagenum"></a>which they +were usually known? Read their instructions to their representatives. +They breathe the spirit of liberty as warmly, and they recommend +reformation as strongly, as any other order. Their privileges relative +to contribution were voluntarily surrendered; as the king, from the +beginning, surrendered all pretence to a right of taxation. Upon a free +constitution there was but one opinion in France. The absolute monarchy +was at an end. It breathed its last without a groan, without struggle, +without convulsion. All the struggle, all the dissension, arose +afterwards, upon the preference of a despotic democracy to a government +of reciprocal control. The triumph of the victorious party was over the +principles of a British Constitution.</p> + +<p>I have observed the affectation which for many years past has prevailed +in Paris, even to a degree perfectly childish, of idolizing the memory +of your Henry the Fourth. If anything could put any one out of humor +with that ornament to the kingly character, it would be this overdone +style of insidious panegyric. The persons who have worked this engine +the most busily are those who have ended their panegyrics in dethroning +his successor and descendant: a man as good-natured, at the least, as +Henry the Fourth; altogether as fond of his people; and who has done +infinitely more to correct the ancient vices of the state than that +great monarch did, or we are sure he ever meant to do. Well it is for +his panegyrists that they have not him to deal with! For Henry of +Navarre was a resolute, active, and politic prince. He possessed, +indeed, great humanity and mildness, but an humanity and mildness that +never stood in the way of his interests. He never sought to be loved +with<a name="Page_412" id="Page_412" title="412" class="pagenum"></a>out putting himself first in a condition to be feared. He used soft +language with determined conduct. He asserted and maintained his +authority in the gross, and distributed his acts of concession only in +the detail. Ho spent the income of his prerogative nobly, but he took +care not to break in upon the capital,—never abandoning for a moment +any of the claims which he made under the fundamental laws, nor sparing +to shed the blood of those who opposed him, often in the field, +sometimes upon the scaffold. Because he knew how to make his virtues +respected by the ungrateful, he has merited the praises of those whom, +if they had lived in his time, he would have shut up in the Bastile, and +brought to punishment along with the regicides whom he hanged after he +had famished Paris into a surrender.</p> + +<p>If these panegyrists are in earnest in their admiration of Henry the +Fourth, they must remember that they cannot think more highly of him +than he did of the noblesse of France,—whose virtue, honor, courage, +patriotism, and loyalty were his constant theme.</p> + +<p>But the nobility of France are degenerated since the days of Henry the +Fourth.—This is possible; but it is more than I can believe to be true +in any great degree. I do not pretend to know France as correctly as +some others; but I have endeavored through my whole life to make myself +acquainted with human nature,—otherwise I should be unfit to take even +my humble part in the service of mankind. In that study I could not pass +by a vast portion of our nature as it appeared modified in a country but +twenty-four miles from the shore of this island. On my best observation, +compared with my best inquiries, I found your nobility for the greater +part composed of men <a name="Page_413" id="Page_413" title="413" class="pagenum"></a>of a high spirit, and of a delicate sense of +honor, both with regard to themselves individually, and with regard to +their whole corps, over whom they kept, beyond what is common in other +countries, a censorial eye. They were tolerably well bred; very +officious, humane, and hospitable; in their conversation frank and open; +with a good military tone; and reasonably tinctured with literature, +particularly of the authors in their own language. Many had pretensions +far above this description. I speak of those who were generally met +with.</p> + +<p>As to their behavior to the inferior classes, they appeared to me to +comport themselves towards them with good-nature, and with something +more nearly approaching to familiarity than is generally practised with +us in the intercourse between the higher and lower ranks of life. To +strike any person, even in the most abject condition, was a thing in a +manner unknown, and would be highly disgraceful. Instances of other +ill-treatment of the humble part of the community were rare; and as to +attacks made upon the property or the personal liberty of the commons, I +never heard of any whatsoever from <i>them</i>,—nor, whilst the laws were in +vigor under the ancient government, would such tyranny in subjects have +been permitted. As men of landed estates, I had no fault to find with +their conduct, though much to reprehend, and much to wish changed, in +many of the old tenures. Where the letting of their land was by rent, I +could not discover that their agreements with their farmers were +oppressive; nor when they were in partnership with the farmer, as often +was the case, have I heard that they had taken the lion's share. The +proportions seemed not inequi<a name="Page_414" id="Page_414" title="414" class="pagenum"></a>table. There might be exceptions; but +certainly they were exceptions only. I have no reason to believe that in +these respects the landed noblesse of France were worse than the landed +gentry of this country,—certainly in no respect more vexatious than the +landholders, not noble, of their own nation. In cities the nobility had +no manner of power; in the country very little. You know, Sir, that much +of the civil government, and the police in the most essential parts, was +not in the hands of that nobility which presents itself first to our +consideration. The revenue, the system and collection of which were the +most grievous parts of the French government, was not administered by +the men of the sword; nor were they answerable for the vices of its +principle, or the vexations, where any such existed, in its management.</p> + +<p>Denying, as I am well warranted to do, that the nobility had any +considerable share in the oppression of the people, in cases in which +real oppression existed, I am ready to admit that they were not without +considerable faults and errors. A foolish imitation of the worst part of +the manners of England, which impaired their natural character, without +substituting in its place what perhaps they meant to copy, has certainly +rendered them worse than formerly they were. Habitual dissoluteness of +manners, continued beyond the pardonable period of life, was more common +amongst them than it is with us; and it reigned with the less hope of +remedy, though possibly with something of less mischief, by being +covered with more exterior decorum. They countenanced too much that +licentious philosophy which has helped to bring on their ruin. There was +another error amongst them <a name="Page_415" id="Page_415" title="415" class="pagenum"></a>more fatal. Those of the commons who +approached to or exceeded many of the nobility in point of wealth were +not fully admitted to the rank and estimation which wealth, in reason +and good policy, ought to bestow in every country,—though I think not +equally with that of other nobility. The two kinds of aristocracy were +too punctiliously kept asunder: less so, however, than in Germany and +some other nations.</p> + +<p>This separation, as I have already taken the liberty of suggesting to +you, I conceive to be one principal cause of the destruction of the old +nobility. The military, particularly, was too exclusively reserved for +men of family. But, after all, this was an error of opinion, which a +conflicting opinion would have rectified. A permanent Assembly, in which +the commons had their share of power, would soon abolish whatever was +too invidious and insulting in these distinctions; and even the faults +in the morals of the nobility would have been probably corrected, by the +greater varieties of occupation and pursuit to which a constitution by +orders would have given rise.</p> + +<p>All this violent cry against the nobility I take to be a mere work of +art. To be honored and even privileged by the laws, opinions, and +inveterate usages of our country, growing out of the prejudice of ages, +has nothing to provoke horror and indignation in any man. Even to be too +tenacious of those privileges is not absolutely a crime. The strong +struggle in every individual to preserve possession of what he has found +to belong to him, and to distinguish him, is one of the securities +against injustice and despotism implanted in our nature. It operates as +an instinct to secure property, and to preserve communities in a settled +<a name="Page_416" id="Page_416" title="416" class="pagenum"></a>state. What is there to shock in this? Nobility is a graceful ornament +to the civil order. It is the Corinthian capital of polished society. +"<i>Omnes boni nobilitati semper favemus</i>," was the saying of a wise and +good man. It is, indeed, one sign of a liberal and benevolent mind to +incline to it with some sort of partial propensity. He feels no +ennobling principle in his own heart, who wishes to level all the +artificial institutions which have been adopted for giving a body to +opinion and permanence to fugitive esteem. It is a sour, malignant, +envious disposition, without taste for the reality, or for any image or +representation of virtue, that sees with joy the unmerited fall of what +had long nourished in splendor and in honor. I do not like to see +anything destroyed, any void produced in society, any ruin on the face +of the land. It was therefore with no disappointment or dissatisfaction +that my inquiries and observations did not present to me any +incorrigible vices in the noblesse of France, or any abuse which could +not be removed by a reform very short of abolition. Your noblesse did +not deserve punishment; but to degrade is to punish.</p> + +<p>It was with the same satisfaction I found that the result of my inquiry +concerning your clergy was not dissimilar. It is no soothing news to my +ears, that great bodies of men are incurably corrupt. It is not with +much credulity I listen to any, when they speak evil of those whom they +are going to plunder. I rather suspect that vices are feigned or +exaggerated, when profit is looked for in their punishment. An enemy is +a bad witness; a robber is a worse. Vices and abuses there were +undoubtedly in that order, and must be. It was an old establishment, and +not <a name="Page_417" id="Page_417" title="417" class="pagenum"></a>frequently revised. But I saw no crimes in the individuals that +merited confiscation of their substance, nor those cruel insults and +degradations, and that unnatural persecution, which have been +substituted in the place of meliorating regulation.</p> + +<p>If there had been any just cause for this new religions persecution, the +atheistic libellers, who act as trumpeters to animate the populace to +plunder, do not love anybody so much as not to dwell with complacence on +the vices of the existing clergy. This they have not done. They find +themselves obliged to rake into the histories of former ages (which they +have ransacked with a malignant and profligate industry) for every +instance of oppression and persecution which has been made by that body +or in its favor, in order to justify, upon very iniquitous because very +illogical principles of retaliation, their own persecutions and their +own cruelties. After destroying all other genealogies and family +distinctions, they invent a sort of pedigree of crimes. It is not very +just to chastise men for the offences of their natural ancestors; but to +take the fiction of ancestry in a corporate succession, as a ground for +punishing men who have no relation to guilty acts, except in names and +general descriptions, is a sort of refinement in injustice belonging to +the philosophy of this enlightened age. The Assembly punishes men, many, +if not most, of whom abhor the violent conduct of ecclesiastics in +former times as much as their present persecutors can do, and who would +be as loud and as strong in the expression of that sense, if they were +not well aware of the purposes for which all this declamation is +employed.</p> + +<p>Corporate bodies are immortal for the good of the <a name="Page_418" id="Page_418" title="418" class="pagenum"></a>members, but not for +their punishment. Nations themselves are such corporations. As well +might we in England think of waging inexpiable war upon all Frenchmen +for the evils which they have brought upon us in the several periods of +our mutual hostilities. You might, on your part, think yourselves +justified in falling upon all Englishmen on account of the unparalleled +calamities brought upon the people of France by the unjust invasions of +our Henrys and our Edwards. Indeed, we should be mutually justified in +this exterminatory war upon each other, full as much as you are in the +unprovoked persecution of your present countrymen, on account of the +conduct of men of the same name in other times.</p> + +<p>We do not draw the moral lessons we might from history. On the contrary, +without care it may be used to vitiate our minds and to destroy our +happiness. In history a great volume is unrolled for our instruction, +drawing the materials of future wisdom from the past errors and +infirmities of mankind. It may, in the perversion, serve for a magazine, +furnishing offensive and defensive weapons for parties in Church and +State, and supplying the means of keeping alive or reviving dissensions +and animosities, and adding fuel to civil fury. History consists, for +the greater part, of the miseries brought upon the world by pride, +ambition, avarice, revenge, lust, sedition, hypocrisy, ungoverned zeal, +and all the train of disorderly appetites, which shake the public with +the same</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">"troublous storms that toss<br /></span> +<span>The private state, and render life unsweet."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="noindent">These vices are the <i>causes</i> of those storms. Religion, morals, laws, +prerogatives, privileges, liberties, rights of men, are the <i>pretexts</i>. +The pretexts are always <a name="Page_419" id="Page_419" title="419" class="pagenum"></a>found in some specious appearance of a real +good. You would not secure men from tyranny and sedition by rooting out +of the mind the principles to which these fraudulent pretexts apply? If +you did, you would root out everything that is valuable in the human +breast. As these are the pretexts, so the ordinary actors and +instruments in great public evils are kings, priests, magistrates, +senates, parliaments, national assemblies, judges, and captains. You +would not cure the evil by resolving that there should be no more +monarchs, nor ministers of state, nor of the Gospel,—no interpreters of +law, no general officers, no public councils. You might change the +names: the things in some shape must remain. A certain <i>quantum</i> of +power must always exist in the community, in some hands, and under some +appellation. Wise men will apply their remedies to vices, not to +names,—to the causes of evil, which are permanent, not to the +occasional organs by which they act, and the transitory modes in which +they appear. Otherwise you will be wise historically, a fool in +practice. Seldom have two ages the same fashion in their pretexts, and +the same modes of mischief. Wickedness is a little more inventive. +Whilst you are discussing fashion, the fashion is gone by. The very same +vice assumes a new body. The spirit transmigrates; and, far from losing +its principle of life by the change of its appearance, it is renovated +in its new organs with the fresh vigor of a juvenile activity. It walks +abroad, it continues its ravages, whilst you are gibbeting the carcass +or demolishing the tomb. You are terrifying yourselves with ghosts and +apparitions, whilst your house is the haunt of robbers. It is thus with +all those who, attending only to the shell and husk <a name="Page_420" id="Page_420" title="420" class="pagenum"></a>of history, think +they are waging war with intolerance, pride, and cruelty, whilst, under +color of abhorring the ill principles of antiquated parties, they are +authorizing and feeding the same odious vices in different factions, and +perhaps in worse.</p> + +<p>Your citizens of Paris formerly had lent themselves as the ready +instruments to slaughter the followers of Calvin, at the infamous +massacre of St. Bartholomew. What should we say to those who could think +of retaliating on the Parisians of this day the abominations and horrors +of that time? They are, indeed, brought to abhor <i>that</i> massacre. +Ferocious as they are, it is not difficult to make them dislike it, +because the politicians and fashionable teachers have no interest in +giving their passions exactly the same direction. Still, however, they +find it their interest to keep the same savage dispositions alive. It +was but the other day that they caused this very massacre to be acted on +the stage for the diversion of the descendants of those who committed +it. In this tragic farce they produced the Cardinal of Lorraine in his +robes of function, ordering general slaughter. Was this spectacle +intended to make the Parisians abhor persecution and loathe the effusion +of blood? No: it was to teach them to persecute their own pastors; it +was to excite them, by raising a disgust and horror of their clergy, to +an alacrity in hunting down to destruction an order which, if it ought +to exist at all, ought to exist not only in safety, but in reverence. It +was to stimulate their cannibal appetites (which one would think had +been gorged sufficiently) by variety and seasoning,—and to quicken them +to an alertness in new murders and massacres, if it should suit the +purpose of the Guises of the day. An As<a name="Page_421" id="Page_421" title="421" class="pagenum"></a>sembly in which sat a multitude +of priests and prelates was obliged to suffer this indignity at its +door. The author was not sent to the galleys, nor the players to the +house of correction. Not long after this exhibition, those players came +forward to the Assembly to claim the rites of that very religion which +they had dared to expose, and to show their prostituted faces in the +senate, whilst the Archbishop of Paris, whose function was known to his +people only by his prayers and benedictions, and his wealth only by +alms, is forced to abandon his house, and to fly from his flock, (as +from ravenous wolves,) because, truly, in the sixteenth century, the +Cardinal of Lorraine was a rebel and a murderer.<a name="FNanchor_113_114" id="FNanchor_113_114"></a><a href="#Footnote_113_114" class="fnanchor" title=" This is on a supposition of the truth of this story; but +he was not in France at the time. One name serves as well as another.">[113]</a></p> + +<p>Such is the effect of the perversion of history by those who, for the +same nefarious purposes, have perverted every other part of learning. +But those who will stand upon that elevation of reason which places +centuries under our eye and brings things to the true point of +comparison, which obscures little names and effaces the colors of little +parties, and to which nothing can ascend but the spirit and moral +quality of human actions, will say to the teachers of the Palais +Royal,—The Cardinal of Lorraine was the murderer of the sixteenth +century; you have the glory of being the murderers in the eighteenth; +and this is the only difference between you. But history in the +nineteenth century, better understood and better employed, will, I +trust, teach a civilized posterity to abhor the misdeeds of both these +barbarous ages. It will teach future priests and magistrates not to +retaliate upon the speculative and inactive <a name="Page_422" id="Page_422" title="422" class="pagenum"></a>atheists of future times +the enormities committed by the present practical zealots and furious +fanatics of that wretched error, which, in its quiescent state, is more +than punished, whenever it is embraced. It will teach posterity not to +make war upon either religion or philosophy for the abuse which the +hypocrites of both have made of the two most valuable blessings +conferred upon us by the bounty of the universal Patron, who in all +things eminently favors and protects the race of man.</p> + +<p>If your clergy, or any clergy, should show themselves vicious beyond the +fair bounds allowed to human infirmity, and to those professional faults +which can hardly be separated from professional virtues, though their +vices never can countenance the exercise of oppression, I do admit that +they would naturally have the effect of abating very much of our +indignation against the tyrants who exceed measure and justice in their +punishment. I can allow in clergymen, through all their divisions, some +tenaciousness of their own opinion, some overflowings of zeal for its +propagation, some predilection to their own state and office, some +attachment to the interest of their own corps, some preference to those +who Us ten with docility to their doctrines beyond those who scorn and +deride them. I allow all this, because I am a man who have to deal with +men, and who would not, through a violence of toleration, run into the +greatest of all intolerance. I must bear with infirmities, until they +fester into crimes.</p> + +<p>Undoubtedly, the natural progress of the passions, from frailty to vice, +ought to be prevented by a watchful eye and a firm hand. But is it true +that the body of your clergy had passed those limits of a <a name="Page_423" id="Page_423" title="423" class="pagenum"></a>just +allowance? Prom the general style of your late publications of all +sorts, one would be led to believe that your clergy in France were a +sort of monsters: an horrible composition of superstition, ignorance, +sloth, fraud, avarice, and tyranny. But is this true? Is it true that +the lapse of time, the cessation of conflicting interests, the woful +experience of the evils resulting from party rage, have had no sort of +influence gradually to meliorate their minds? Is it true that they were +daily renewing invasions on the civil power, troubling the domestic +quiet of their country, and rendering the operations of its government +feeble and precarious? Is it true that the clergy of our times have +pressed down the laity with an iron hand, and were in all places +lighting up the fires of a savage persecution? Did they by every fraud +endeavor to increase their estates? Did they use to exceed the due +demands on estates that were their own? Or, rigidly screwing up right +into wrong, did they convert a legal claim into a vexatious extortion? +When not possessed of power, were they filled with the vices of those +who envy it? Were they inflamed with a violent, litigious spirit of +controversy? Goaded on with the ambition of intellectual sovereignty, +were they ready to fly in the face of all magistracy, to fire churches, +to massacre the priests of other descriptions, to pull down altars, and +to make their way over the ruins of subverted governments to an empire +of doctrine, sometimes flattering, sometimes forcing, the consciences of +men from the jurisdiction of public institutions into a submission to +their personal authority, beginning with a claim of liberty and ending +with an abuse of power?</p> + +<p>These, or some of these, were the vices objected, <a name="Page_424" id="Page_424" title="424" class="pagenum"></a>and not wholly +without foundation, to several of the churchmen of former times, who +belonged to the two great parties which then divided and distracted +Europe.</p> + +<p>If there was in France, as in other countries there visibly is, a great +abatement, rather than any increase of these vices, instead of loading +the present clergy with the crimes of other men and the odious character +of other times, in common equity they ought to be praised, encouraged, +and supported, in their departure from a spirit which disgraced their +predecessors, and for having assumed a temper of mind and manners more +suitable to their sacred function.</p> + +<p>When my occasions took me into France, towards the close of the late +reign, the clergy, under all their forms, engaged a considerable part of +my curiosity. So far from finding (except from one set of men, not then +very numerous, though very active) the complaints and discontents +against that body which some publications had given me reason to expect, +I perceived little or no public or private uneasiness on their account. +On further examination, I found the clergy, in general, persons of +moderate minds and decorous manners: I include the seculars, and the +regulars of both sexes. I had not the good fortune to know a great many +of the parochial clergy: but in general I received a perfectly good +account of their morals, and of their attention to their duties. With +some of the higher clergy I had a personal acquaintance, and of the rest +in that class a very good means of information. They were almost all of +them persons of noble birth. They resembled others of their own rank; +and where there was any difference, it was <a name="Page_425" id="Page_425" title="425" class="pagenum"></a>in their favor. They were +more fully educated than the military noblesse,—so as by no means to +disgrace their profession by ignorance, or by want of fitness for the +exercise of their authority. They seemed to me, beyond the clerical +character, liberal and open, with the hearts of gentlemen and men of +honor, neither insolent nor servile in their manners and conduct. They +seemed to me rather a superior class,—a set of men amongst whom you +would not be surprised to find a Fénelon. I saw among the clergy in +Paris (many of the description are not to be met with anywhere) men of +great learning and candor; and I had reason to believe that this +description was not confined to Paris. What I found in other places I +know was accidental, and therefore to be presumed a fair sample. I spent +a few days in a provincial town, where, in the absence of the bishop, I +passed my evenings with three clergymen, his vicars-general, persons who +would have done honor to any church. They were all well-informed; two of +them of deep, general, and extensive erudition, ancient and modern, +Oriental and Western,—particularly in their own profession. They had a +more extensive knowledge of our English divines than I expected; and +they entered into the genius of those writers with a critical accuracy. +One of these gentlemen is since dead: the Abbé Morangis. I pay this +tribute without reluctance to the memory of that noble, reverend, +learned, and excellent person; and I should do the same with equal +cheerfulness to the merits of the others, who I believe are still +living, if I did not fear to hurt those whom I am unable to serve.</p> + +<p>Some of these ecclesiastics of rank are, by all titles, persons +deserving of general respect. They <a name="Page_426" id="Page_426" title="426" class="pagenum"></a>are deserving of gratitude from me, +and from many English. If this letter should ever come into their hands, +I hope they will believe there are those of our nation who feel for +their unmerited fall, and for the cruel confiscation of their fortunes, +with no common sensibility. What I say of them is a testimony, as far as +one feeble voice can go, which I owe to truth. Whenever the question of +this unnatural persecution is concerned, I will pay it. No one shall +prevent me from being just and grateful. The time is fitted for the +duty; and it is particularly becoming to show our justice and gratitude, +when those who have deserved well of us and of mankind are laboring +under popular obloquy and the persecutions of oppressive power.</p> + +<p>You had before your Revolution about a hundred and twenty bishops. A few +of them were men of eminent sanctity, and charity without limit. When we +talk of the heroic, of course we talk of rare virtue. I believe the +instances of eminent depravity may be as rare amongst them as those of +transcendent goodness. Examples of avarice and of licentiousness may be +picked out, I do not question it, by those who delight in the +investigation which leads to such discoveries. A man as old as I am will +not be astonished that several, in every description, do not lead that +perfect life of self-denial, with regard to wealth or to pleasure, which +is wished for by all, by some expected, but by none exacted with more +rigor than by those who are the most attentive to their own interests or +the most indulgent to their own passions. When I was in France, I am +certain that the number of vicious prelates was not great. Certain +individuals among them, not distinguishable for the regularity of <a name="Page_427" id="Page_427" title="427" class="pagenum"></a>their +lives, made some amends for their want of the severe virtues in their +possession of the liberal, and wore endowed with qualities which made +them useful in the Church and State. I am told, that, with few +exceptions, Louis the Sixteenth had been more attentive to character, in +his promotions to that rank, than his immediate predecessor; and I +believe (as some spirit of reform has prevailed through the whole reign) +that it may be true. But the present ruling power has shown a +disposition only to plunder the Church. It has punished <i>all</i> prelates: +which is to favor the vicious, at least in point of reputation. It has +made a degrading pensionary establishment, to which no man of liberal +ideas or liberal condition will destine his children. It must settle +into the lowest classes of the people. As with you the inferior clergy +are not numerous enough for their duties, as these duties are beyond +measure minute and toilsome, as you have left no middle classes of +clergy at their ease, in future nothing of science or erudition can +exist in the Gallican Church. To complete the project, without the least +attention to the rights of patrons, the Assembly has provided in future +an elective clergy: an arrangement which will drive out of the clerical +profession all men of sobriety, all who can pretend to independence in +their function or their conduct,—and which will throw the whole +direction of the public mind into the hands of a set of licentious, +bold, crafty, factious, flattering wretches, of such condition and such +habits of life as will make their contemptible pensions (in comparison +of which the stipend of an exciseman is lucrative and honorable) an +object of low and illiberal intrigue. Those officers whom they still +call bishops are to be elected <a name="Page_428" id="Page_428" title="428" class="pagenum"></a>to a provision comparatively mean, +through the same arts, (that is, electioneering arts,) by men of all +religious tenets that are known or can be invented. The new lawgivers +have not ascertained anything whatsoever concerning their +qualifications, relative either to doctrine or to morals, no more than +they have done with regard to the subordinate clergy; nor does it appear +but that both the higher and the lower may, at their discretion, +practise or preach any mode of religion or irreligion that they please. +I do not yet see what the jurisdiction of bishops over their +subordinates is to be, or whether they are to have any jurisdiction at +all.</p> + +<p>In short, Sir, it seems to me that this new ecclesiastical establishment +is intended only to be temporary, and preparatory to the utter +abolition, under any of its forms, of the Christian religion, whenever +the minds of men are prepared for this last stroke against it by the +accomplishment of the plan for bringing its ministers into universal +contempt. They who will not believe that the philosophical fanatics who +guide in these matters have long entertained such a design are utterly +ignorant of their character and proceedings. These enthusiasts do not +scruple to avow their opinion, that a state can subsist without any +religion better than with one, and that they are able to supply the +place of any good which may be in it by a project of their own,—namely, +by a sort of education they have imagined, founded in a knowledge of the +physical wants of men, progressively carried to an enlightened +self-interest, which, when well understood, they tell us, will identify +with an interest more enlarged and public. The scheme of this education +has been long known. Of late they distin<a name="Page_429" id="Page_429" title="429" class="pagenum"></a>guish it (as they have got an +entirely new nomenclature of technical terms) by the name of a <i>Civic +Education</i>.</p> + +<p>I hope their partisans in England (to whom I rather attribute very +inconsiderate conduct than the ultimate object in this detestable +design) will succeed neither in the pillage of the ecclesiastics nor in +the introduction of a principle of popular election to our bishoprics +and parochial cures. This, in the present condition of the world, would +be the last corruption of the Church, the utter ruin of the clerical +character, the most dangerous shock that the state ever received through +a misunderstood arrangement of religion. I know well enough that the +bishoprics and cures, under kingly and seigniorial patronage, as now +they are in England, and as they have been lately in France, are +sometimes acquired by unworthy methods; but the other mode of +ecclesiastical canvass subjects them infinitely more surely and more +generally to all the evil arts of low ambition, which, operating on and +through greater numbers, will produce mischief in proportion.</p> + +<p>Those of you who have robbed the clergy think that they shall easily +reconcile their conduct to all Protestant nations, because the clergy +whom they have thus plundered, degraded, and given over to mockery and +scorn, are of the Roman Catholic, that is, of <i>their own</i> pretended +persuasion. I have no doubt that some miserable bigots will be found +here as well as elsewhere, who hate sects and parties different from +their own more than they love the substance of religion, and who are +more angry with those who differ from them in their particular plans and +systems than displeased with those who attack <a name="Page_430" id="Page_430" title="430" class="pagenum"></a>the foundation of our +common hope. These men will write and speak on the subject in the manner +that is to be expected from their temper and character. Burnet says, +that, when he was in France, in the year 1683, "the method which carried +over the men of the finest parts to Popery was this: they brought +themselves to doubt of the whole Christian religion: when that was once +done, it seemed a more indifferent thing of what side or form they +continued outwardly." If this was then the ecclesiastic policy of +France, it is what they have since but too much reason to repent of. +They preferred atheism to a form of religion not agreeable to their +ideas. They succeeded in destroying that form; and atheism has succeeded +in destroying them. I can readily give credit to Burnet's story; because +I have observed too much of a similar spirit (for a little of it is +"much too much") amongst ourselves. The humor, however, is not general.</p> + +<p>The teachers who reformed our religion in England bore no sort of +resemblance to your present reforming doctors in Paris. Perhaps they +were (like those whom they opposed) rather more than could be wished +under the influence of a party spirit; but they were most sincere +believers; men of the most fervent and exalted piety; ready to die (as +some of them did die) like true heroes in defence of their particular +ideas of Christianity,—as they would with equal fortitude, and more +cheerfully, for that stock of general truth for the branches of which +they contended with their blood. These men would have disavowed with +horror those wretches who claimed a fellowship with them upon no other +titles than those of their having pillaged the persons with whom <a name="Page_431" id="Page_431" title="431" class="pagenum"></a>they +maintained controversies, and their having despised the common religion, +for the purity of which they exerted themselves with a zeal which +unequivocally bespoke their highest reverence for the substance of that +system which they wished to reform. Many of their descendants have +retained the same zeal, but (as less engaged in conflict) with more +moderation. They do not forget that justice and mercy are substantial +parts of religion. Impious men do not recommend themselves to their +communion by iniquity and cruelty towards any description of their +fellow-creatures.</p> + +<p>We hear these new teachers continually boasting of their spirit of +toleration. That those persons should tolerate all opinions, who think +none to be of estimation, is a matter of small merit. Equal neglect is +not impartial kindness. The species of benevolence which arises from +contempt is no true charity. There are in England abundance of men who +tolerate in the true spirit of toleration. They think the dogmas of +religion, though in different degrees, are all of moment, and that +amongst them there is, as amongst all things of value, a just ground of +preference. They favor, therefore, and they tolerate. They tolerate, not +because they despise opinions, but because they respect justice. They +would reverently and affectionately protect all religions, because they +love and venerate the great principle upon which they all agree, and the +great object to which they are all directed. They begin more and more +plainly to discern that we have all a common cause, as against a common +enemy. They will not be so misled by the spirit of faction as not to +distinguish what is done in favor of their subdivision from those <a name="Page_432" id="Page_432" title="432" class="pagenum"></a>acts +of hostility which, through some particular description, are aimed at +the whole corps in which they themselves, under another denomination, +are included. It is impossible for me to say what may be the character +of every description of men amongst us. But I speak for the greater +part; and for them, I must tell you, that sacrilege is no part of their +doctrine of good works; that, so far from calling you into their +fellowship on such title, if your professors are admitted to their +communion, they must carefully conceal their doctrine of the lawfulness +of the proscription of innocent men, and that they must make restitution +of all stolen goods whatsoever. Till then they are none of ours.</p> + +<p>You may suppose that we do not approve your confiscation of the revenues +of bishops, and deans, and chapters, and parochial clergy possessing +independent estates arising from land, because we have the same sort of +establishment in England. That objection, you will say, cannot hold as +to the confiscation of the goods of monks and nuns, and the abolition of +their order. It is true that this particular part of your general +confiscation does not affect England, as a precedent in point; but the +reason applies, and it goes a great way. The Long Parliament confiscated +the lands of deans and chapters in England on the same ideas upon which +your Assembly set to sale the lands of the monastic orders. But it is in +the principle of injustice that the danger lies, and not in the +description of persons on whom it is first exercised. I see, in a +country very near us, a course of policy pursued, which sets justice, +the common concern of mankind, at defiance. With the National Assembly +of France possession is nothing, law and usage are <a name="Page_433" id="Page_433" title="433" class="pagenum"></a>nothing. I see the +National Assembly openly reprobate the doctrine of prescription, which +one of the greatest of their own lawyers<a name="FNanchor_114_115" id="FNanchor_114_115"></a><a href="#Footnote_114_115" class="fnanchor" title=" Domat.">[114]</a> tells us, with great +truth, is a part of the law of Nature. He tells us that the positive +ascertainment of its limits, and its security from invasion, were among +the causes for which civil society itself has been instituted. If +prescription be once shaken, no species of property is secure, when it +once becomes an object large enough to tempt the cupidity of indigent +power. I see a practice perfectly correspondent to their contempt of +this great fundamental part of natural law. I see the confiscators begin +with bishops, and chapters, and monasteries; but I do not see them end +there. I see the princes of the blood, who, by the oldest usages of that +kingdom, held large landed estates, (hardly with the compliment of a +debate,) deprived of their possessions, and, in lieu of their stable, +independent property, reduced to the hope of some precarious charitable +pension at the pleasure of an Assembly, which of course will pay little +regard to the rights of pensioners at pleasure, when it despises those +of legal proprietors. Flushed with the insolence of their first +inglorious victories, and pressed by the distresses caused by their lust +of unhallowed lucre, disappointed, but not discouraged, they have at +length ventured completely to subvert all property of all descriptions +throughout the extent of a great kingdom. They have compelled all men, +in all transactions of commerce, in the disposal of lands, in civil +dealing, and through the whole communion of life, to accept, as perfect +payment and good and lawful tender, the symbols of their speculations on +a projected sale of <a name="Page_434" id="Page_434" title="434" class="pagenum"></a>their plunder. What vestiges of liberty or property +have they left? The tenant-right of a cabbage-garden, a year's interest +in a hovel, the good-will of an ale-house or a baker's shop, the very +shadow of a constructive property, are more ceremoniously treated in our +Parliament than with you the oldest and most valuable landed +possessions, in the hands of the most respectable personages, or than +the whole body of the moneyed and commercial interest of your country. +We entertain a high opinion of the legislative authority; but we have +never dreamt that Parliaments had any right whatever to violate +property, to overrule prescription, or to force a currency of their own +fiction in the place of that which is real, and recognized by the law of +nations. But you, who began with refusing to submit to the most moderate +restraints, have ended by establishing an unheard-of despotism. I find +the ground upon which your confiscators go is this: that, indeed, their +proceedings could not be supported in a court of justice, but that the +rules of prescription cannot bind a legislative assembly.<a name="FNanchor_115_116" id="FNanchor_115_116"></a><a href="#Footnote_115_116" class="fnanchor" title=" Speech of M. Camus, published by order of the National +Assembly.">[115]</a> So that +this legislative assembly of a free nation sits, not for the security, +but for the destruction of property,—and not of property only, but of +every rule and maxim which can give it stability, and of those +instruments which can alone give it circulation.</p> + +<p>When the Anabaptists of Munster, in the sixteenth century, had filled +Germany with confusion, by their system of levelling, and their wild +opinions concerning property, to what country in Europe did not the +progress of their fury furnish just cause of alarm?<a name="Page_435" id="Page_435" title="435" class="pagenum"></a> Of all things, +wisdom is the most terrified with epidemical fanaticism, because of all +enemies it is that against which she is the least able to furnish any +kind of resource. We cannot be ignorant of the spirit of atheistical +fanaticism, that is inspired by a multitude of writings dispersed with +incredible assiduity and expense, and by sermons delivered in all the +streets and places of public resort in Paris. These writings and sermons +have filled the populace with a black and savage atrocity of mind, which +supersedes in them the common feelings of Nature, as well as all +sentiments of morality and religion; insomuch that these wretches are +induced to bear with a sullen patience the intolerable distresses +brought upon them by the violent convulsions and permutations that have +been made in property.<a name="FNanchor_116_117" id="FNanchor_116_117"></a><a href="#Footnote_116_117" class="fnanchor" title=" Whether the following description is strictly true I know +not; but it is what the publishers would have pass for true, in order to +animate others. In a letter from Toul, given in one of their papers, is +the following passage concerning the people of that district:—"Dans la +Révolution actuelle, ils ont résisté à toutes les _séductions du +bigotisme, aux persécutions et aux tracasseries_ des ennemis de la +Révolution. _Oubliant leurs plus grands intérêts_ pour rendre hommage +aux vues d'ordre général qui out déterminé l'Assemblée Nationale, ils +voient, _sans se plaindre_, supprimer cette foule d'établissemens +ecclésiastiques par lesquels _ils subsistoient_; et même, en perdant +leur siège épiscopal, la seule de toutes ces ressources qui pouvoit, on +plutôt _qui devoit, en toute équité_, leur être conservée, condamnés _à +la plus effrayante misère_ sans avoir _été ni pu être entendus, ils ne +murmurent point_, ils restent fidèles aux principes du plus pur +patriotisme; ils sont encore prêts à _verser leur sang_ pour le maintien +de la constitution, qui va réduire leur ville _à la plus déplorable +nullité_."—These people are not supposed to have endured those +sufferings and injustices in a struggle for liberty, for the same +account states truly that they have been always free; their patience in +beggary and ruin, and their suffering, without remonstrance, the most +flagrant and confessed injustice, if strictly true, can be nothing but +the effect of this dire fanaticism. A great multitude all over France is +in the same condition and the same temper.">[116]</a> The spirit of proselytism attends this +spirit of fanaticism. They have societies to cabal and correspond at +home and abroad for the propagation of their tenets. The republic of +Berne, one of the happiest, the most prosperous, and the best-governed +countries upon earth, is one of the great objects at the destruction of +which they aim. I am told they have in some measure succeeded in sowing +there the <a name="Page_436" id="Page_436" title="436" class="pagenum"></a>seeds of discontent. They are busy throughout Germany. Spain +and Italy have not been untried. England is not left out of the +comprehensive scheme of their malignant charity: and in England we find +those who stretch out their arms to them, who recommend their example +from more than one pulpit, and who choose, in more than one periodical +meeting, publicly to correspond with them, to applaud them, and to hold +them up as objects for imitation; who receive from them tokens of +confraternity, and standards consecrated amidst their rites and +mysteries;<a name="FNanchor_117_118" id="FNanchor_117_118"></a><a href="#Footnote_117_118" class="fnanchor" title=" See the proceedings of the confederation at Nantes.">[117]</a> who suggest to them leagues of perpetual amity, at the +very time when the power to which our Constitution has exclusively +delegated the federative capacity of this kingdom may find it expedient +to make war upon them.</p> + +<p>It is not the confiscation of our Church property from this example in +France that I dread, though I think this would be no trifling evil. The +great source of my solicitude is, lest it should ever be considered in +England as the policy of a state to seek a resource in confiscations of +any kind, or that any one description of citizens should be brought to +re<a name="Page_437" id="Page_437" title="437" class="pagenum"></a>gard any of the others as their proper prey.<a name="FNanchor_118_119" id="FNanchor_118_119"></a><a href="#Footnote_118_119" class="fnanchor" title=" "Si plures sunt ii quibus improbe datum est, quam illi +quibus injuste ademptum est, idcirco plus etiam valent? Non enim numero +hæc judicantur, sed pondere. Quam autem habet æquitatem, ut agrum multis +annis, aut etiam sæculis ante possessum, qui nullum habuit habeat, qui +autem habuit amittat? Ac, propter hoc injuriæ genus, Lacedæmonii +Lysandrum Ephorum expulerunt; Agin regem (quod nunquam antea apud eos +acciderat) necaverunt; exque eo tempore tantæ discordiæ secutæ sunt, ut +et tyranni exsisterent, et optimates exterminarentur, et preclarissime +constituta respublica dilaberetur. Nec vero solum ipsa cecidit, sed +etiam reliquam Græciam evertit contagionibus malorum, quæ a Lacedæmoniis +profectæ manarunt latius."—After speaking of the conduct of the model +of true patriots, Aratus of Sicyon, which was in a very different +spirit, he says,—"Sic par est agere cum civibus; non (ut bis jam +vidimus) hastam in foro ponere et bona civium voci subjicere præconis. +At ille Græcus (id quod fuit sapientis et præstantis viri) omnibus +consulendum esse putavit: eaque est summa ratio et sapientia boni civis, +commoda civium non divellere, sed omnes eadem æquitate continere."—Cic. +Off. 1. 2.">[118]</a> Nations are wading +deeper and deeper into an ocean of boundless debt. Public debts, which +at first were a security to governments, by interesting many in the +public tranquillity, are likely in their excess to become the means of +their subversion. If governments provide for these debts by heavy +impositions, they perish by becoming odious to the people. If they do +not provide for them, they will be undone by the efforts of the most +dangerous of all parties: I mean an extensive, discontented moneyed +interest, injured and not destroyed. The men who compose this interest +look for their security, in the first instance, to the fidelity of +government; in the second, to its power. If they find the old +governments effete, worn out, and with their springs relaxed, so as not +to be of sufficient vigor for their purposes, they may seek new ones +<a name="Page_438" id="Page_438" title="438" class="pagenum"></a>that shall be possessed of more energy; and this energy will be +derived, not from an acquisition of resources, but from a contempt of +justice. Revolutions are favorable to confiscation; and it is impossible +to know under what obnoxious names the next confiscations will be +authorized. I am sure that the principles predominant in France extend +to very many persons, and descriptions of persons, in all countries, who +think their innoxious indolence their security. This kind of innocence +in proprietors may be argued into inutility; and inutility into an +unfitness for their estates. Many parts of Europe are in open disorder. +In many others there is a hollow murmuring under ground; a confused +movement is felt, that threatens a general earthquake in the political +world. Already confederacies and correspondences of the most +extraordinary nature are forming in several countries.<a name="FNanchor_119_120" id="FNanchor_119_120"></a><a href="#Footnote_119_120" class="fnanchor" title=" See two books entitled, "Einige Originalschriften des +Illuminatenordens,"—"System und Folgen des Illuminatenordens." München, +1787.">[119]</a> In such a +state of things we ought to hold ourselves upon our guard. In all +mutations (if mutations must be) the circumstance which will serve most +to blunt the edge of their mischief, and to promote what good may be in +them, is, that they should find us with our minds tenacious of justice +and tender of property.</p> + +<p>But it will be argued, that this confiscation in France ought not to +alarm other nations. They say it is not made from wanton rapacity; that +it is a great measure of national policy, adopted to remove an +extensive, inveterate, superstitious mischief.—It is with the greatest +difficulty that I am able to separate policy from justice. Justice is +itself the great standing policy of civil society; and any eminent +depart<a name="Page_439" id="Page_439" title="439" class="pagenum"></a>ure from it, under any circumstances, lies under the suspicion of +being no policy at all.</p> + +<p>When men are encouraged to go into a certain mode of life by the +existing laws, and protected in that mode as in a lawful +occupation,—when they have accommodated all their ideas and all their +habits to it,—when the law had long made their adherence to its rules a +ground of reputation, and their departure from them a ground of disgrace +and even of penalty,—I am sure it is unjust in legislature, by an +arbitrary act, to offer a sudden violence to their minds and their +feelings, forcibly to degrade them from their state and condition, and +to stigmatize with shame and infamy that character and those customs +which before had been made the measure of their happiness and honor. If +to this be added an expulsion from their habitations and a confiscation +of all their goods, I am not sagacious enough to discover how this +despotic sport made of the feelings, consciences, prejudices, and +properties of men can be discriminated from the rankest tyranny.</p> + +<p>If the injustice of the course pursued in France be clear, the policy of +the measure, that is, the public benefit to be expected from it, ought +to be at least as evident, and at least as important. To a man who acts +under the influence of no passion, who has nothing in view in his +projects but the public good, a great difference will immediately strike +him, between what policy would dictate on the original introduction of +such institutions, and on a question of their total abolition, where +they have cast their roots wide and deep, and where, by long habit, +things more valuable than themselves are so adapted to them, and in a +manner interwoven with them, that the one cannot <a name="Page_440" id="Page_440" title="440" class="pagenum"></a>be destroyed without +notably impairing the other. He might be embarrassed, if the case were +really such as sophisters represent it in their paltry style of +debating. But in this, as in most questions of state, there is a middle. +There is something else than the mere alternative of absolute +destruction or unreformed existence. <i>Spartam nactus es; hanc exorna</i>. +This is, in my opinion, a rule of profound sense, and ought never to +depart from the mind of an honest reformer. I cannot conceive how any +man can have brought himself to that pitch of presumption, to consider +his country as nothing but <i>carte blanche</i>, upon which he may scribble +whatever he pleases. A man full of warm, speculative benevolence may +wish his society otherwise constituted than he finds it; but a good +patriot, and a true politician, always considers how he shall make the +most of the existing materials of his country. A disposition to +preserve, and an ability to improve, taken together, would be my +standard of a statesman. Everything else is vulgar in the conception, +perilous in the execution.</p> + +<p>There are moments in the fortune of states, when particular men are +called to make improvements by great mental exertion. In those moments, +even when they seem to enjoy the confidence of their prince and country, +and to be invested with full authority, they have not always apt +instruments. A politician, to do great things, looks for a <i>power</i>, what +our workmen call a <i>purchase</i>; and if he finds that power, in politics +as in mechanics, he cannot be at a loss to apply it. In the monastic +institutions, in my opinion, was found a great <i>power</i> for the mechanism +of politic benevolence. There were revenues with a public direction; +there were men wholly set apart and dedicated <a name="Page_441" id="Page_441" title="441" class="pagenum"></a>to public purposes, +without any other than public ties and public principles,—men without +the possibility of converting the estate of the community into a private +fortune,—men denied to self-interests, whose avarice is for some +community,—men to whom personal poverty is honor, and implicit +obedience stands in the place of freedom. In vain shall a man look to +the possibility of making such things when he wants them. The winds blow +as they list. These institutions are the products of enthusiasm; they +are the instruments of wisdom. Wisdom cannot create materials; they are +the gifts of Nature or of chance; her pride is in the use. The perennial +existence of bodies corporate and their fortunes are things particularly +suited to a man who has long views,—who meditates designs that require +time in fashioning, and which propose duration when they are +accomplished. He is not deserving to rank high, or even to be mentioned +in the order of great statesmen, who, having obtained the command and +direction of such a power as existed in the wealth, the discipline, and +the habits of such corporations as those which you have rashly +destroyed, cannot find any way of converting it to the great and lasting +benefit of his country. On the view of this subject, a thousand uses +suggest themselves to a contriving mind. To destroy any power growing +wild from the rank productive force of the human mind is almost +tantamount, in the moral world, to the destruction of the apparently +active properties of bodies in the material. It would be like the +attempt to destroy (if it were in our competence to destroy) the +expansive force of fixed air in nitre, or the power of steam, or of +electricity, or of magnetism. These energies always existed in Na<a name="Page_442" id="Page_442" title="442" class="pagenum"></a>ture, +and they were always discernible. They seemed, some of them +unserviceable, some noxious, some no better than a sport to +children,—until contemplative ability, combining with practic skill, +tamed their wild nature, subdued them to use, and rendered them at once +the most powerful and the most tractable agents, in subservience to the +great views and designs of men. Did fifty thousand persons, whose mental +and whose bodily labor you might direct, and so many hundred thousand a +year of a revenue, which was neither lazy nor superstitious, appear too +big for your abilities to wield? Had you no way of using the men, but by +converting monks into pensioners? Had you no way of turning the revenue +to account, but through the improvident resource of a spendthrift sale? +If you were thus destitute of mental funds, the proceeding is in its +natural course. Your politicians do not understand their trade; and +therefore they sell their tools.</p> + +<p>But the institutions savor of superstition in their very principle; and +they nourish it by a permanent and standing influence.—This I do not +mean to dispute; but this ought not to hinder you from deriving from +superstition itself any resources which may thence be furnished for the +public advantage. You derive benefits from many dispositions and many +passions of the human mind which are of as doubtful a color, in the +moral eye, as superstition itself. It was your business to correct and +mitigate everything which was noxious in this passion, as in all the +passions. But is superstition the greatest of all possible vices? In its +possible excess I think it becomes a very great evil. It is, however, a +moral subject, and of course admits of all degrees and all +modifica<a name="Page_443" id="Page_443" title="443" class="pagenum"></a>tions. Superstition is the religion of feeble minds; and they +must be tolerated in an intermixture of it, in some trifling or some +enthusiastic shape or other, else you will deprive weak minds of a +resource found necessary to the strongest. The body of all true religion +consists, to be sure, in obedience to the will of the Sovereign of the +world, in a confidence in His declarations, and in imitation of His +perfections. The rest is our own. It may be prejudicial to the great +end,—it may be auxiliary. Wise men, who, as such, are not <i>admirers</i>, +(not admirers at least of the <i>munera terræ</i>,) are not violently +attached to these things, nor do they violently hate them. Wisdom is not +the most severe corrector of folly. They are the rival follies which +mutually wage so unrelenting a war, and which make so cruel a use of +their advantages, as they can happen to engage the immoderate vulgar, on +the one side or the other, in their quarrels. Prudence would be neuter; +but if, in the contention between fond attachment and fierce antipathy +concerning things in their nature not made to produce such heats, a +prudent man were obliged to make a choice of what errors and excesses of +enthusiasm he would condemn or bear, perhaps he would think the +superstition which builds to be more tolerable than that which +demolishes,—that which adorns a country, than that which deforms +it,—that which endows, than that which plunders,—that which disposes +to mistaken beneficence, than that which stimulates to real +injustice,—that which leads a man to refuse to himself lawful +pleasures, than that which snatches from others the scanty subsistence +of their self-denial. Such, I think, is very nearly the state of the +question between the ancient founders <a name="Page_444" id="Page_444" title="444" class="pagenum"></a>of monkish superstition and the +superstition of the pretended philosophers of the hour.</p> + +<p>For the present I postpone all consideration of the supposed public +profit of the sale, which, however, I conceive to be perfectly delusive. +I shall here only consider it as a transfer of property. On the policy +of that transfer I shall trouble you with a few thoughts.</p> + +<p>In every prosperous community something more is produced than goes to +the immediate support of the producer. This surplus forms the income of +the landed capitalist. It will be spent by a proprietor who does not +labor. But this idleness is itself the spring of labor, this repose the +spur to industry. The only concern for the state is, that the capital +taken in rent from the land should be returned again to the industry +from whence it came, and that its expenditure should be with the least +possible detriment to the morals of those who expend it and to those of +the people to whom it is returned.</p> + +<p>In all the views of receipt, expenditure, and personal employment, a +sober legislator would carefully compare the possessor whom he was +recommended to expel with the stranger who was proposed to fill his +place. Before the inconveniences are incurred which <i>must</i> attend all +violent revolutions in property through extensive confiscation, we ought +to have some rational assurance that the purchasers of the confiscated +property will be in a considerable degree more laborious, more virtuous, +more sober, less disposed to extort an unreasonable proportion of the +gains of the laborer, or to consume on themselves a larger share than is +fit for the measure of an individual,—or that they should be qualified +to dispense the <a name="Page_445" id="Page_445" title="445" class="pagenum"></a>surplus in a more steady and equal mode, so as to +answer the purposes of a politic expenditure, than the old possessors, +call those possessors bishops, or canons, or commendatory abbots, or +monks, or what you please. The monks are lazy. Be it so. Suppose them no +otherwise employed than by singing in the choir. They are as usefully +employed as those who neither sing nor say,—as usefully even as those +who sing upon the stage. They are as usefully employed as if they worked +from dawn to dark in the innumerable servile, degrading, unseemly, +unmanly, and often most unwholesome and pestiferous occupations to which +by the social economy so many wretches are inevitably doomed. If it were +not generally pernicious to disturb the natural course of things, and to +impede in any degree the great wheel of circulation which is turned by +the strangely directed labor of these unhappy people, I should be +infinitely more inclined forcibly to rescue them from their miserable +industry than violently to disturb the tranquil repose of monastic +quietude. Humanity, and perhaps policy, might better justify me in the +one than in the other. It is a subject on which I have often reflected, +and never reflected without feeling from it. I am sure that no +consideration, except the necessity of submitting to the yoke of luxury +and the despotism of fancy, who in their own imperious way will +distribute the surplus product of the soil, can justify the toleration +of such trades and employments in a well-regulated state. But for this +purpose of distribution, it seems to me that the idle expenses of monks +are quite as well directed as the idle expenses of us lay loiterers.</p> + +<p>When the advantages of the possession and of the <a name="Page_446" id="Page_446" title="446" class="pagenum"></a>project are on a par, +there is no motive for a change. But in the present case, perhaps, they +are not upon a par, and the difference is in favor of the possession. It +does not appear to me that the expenses of those whom you are going to +expel do in fact take a course so directly and so generally leading to +vitiate and degrade and render miserable those through whom they pass as +the expenses of those favorites whom you are intruding into their +houses. Why should the expenditure of a great landed property, which is +a dispersion of the surplus product of the soil, appear intolerable to +you or to me, when it takes its course through the accumulation of vast +libraries, which are the history of the force and weakness of the human +mind,—through great collections of ancient records, medals, and coins, +which attest and explain laws and customs,—through paintings and +statues, that, by imitating Nature, seem to extend the limits of +creation,—through grand monuments of the dead, which continue the +regards and connections of life beyond the grave,—through collections +of the specimens of Nature, which become a representative assembly of +all the classes and families of the world, that by disposition +facilitate, and by exciting curiosity open, the avenues to science? If +by great permanent establishments all these objects of expense are +better secured from the inconstant sport of personal caprice and +personal extravagance, are they worse than if the same tastes prevailed +in scattered individuals? Does not the sweat of the mason and carpenter, +who toil in order to partake the sweat of the peasant, flow as +pleasantly and as salubriously in the construction and repair of the +majestic edifices of religion as in the painted booths and sordid sties +of <a name="Page_447" id="Page_447" title="447" class="pagenum"></a>vice and luxury? as honorably and as profitably in repairing those +sacred works which grow hoary with innumerable years as on the momentary +receptacles of transient voluptuousness,—in opera-houses, and brothels, +and gaming-houses, and club-houses, and obelisks in the Champ de Mars? +Is the surplus product of the olive and the vine worse employed in the +frugal sustenance of persons whom the fictions of a pious imagination +raise to dignity by construing in the service of God than in pampering +the innumerable multitude of those who are degraded by being made +useless domestics, subservient to the pride of man? Are the decorations +of temples an expenditure less worthy a wise man than ribbons, and +laces, and national cockades, and petit maisons, and petit soupers, and +all the innumerable fopperies and follies in which opulence sports away +the burden of its superfluity?</p> + +<p>We tolerate even these,—not from love of them, but for fear of worse. +We tolerate them, because property and liberty, to a degree, require +that toleration. But why proscribe the other, and surely, in every point +of view, the more laudable use of estates? Why, through the violation of +all property, through an outrage upon every principle of liberty, +forcibly carry them from the better to the worse?</p> + +<p>This comparison between the new individuals and the old corps is made +upon a supposition that no reform could be made in the latter. But, in a +question of reformation, I always consider corporate bodies, whether +sole or consisting of many, to be much more susceptible of a public +direction, by the power of the state, in the use of their property, and +in the regulation of modes and habits of life in their members, <a name="Page_448" id="Page_448" title="448" class="pagenum"></a>than +private citizens ever can be, or perhaps ought to be; and this seems to +me a very material consideration for those who undertake anything which +merits the name of a politic enterprise.—So far as to the estates of +monasteries.</p> + +<p>With regard to the estates possessed by bishops and canons and +commendatory abbots, I cannot find out for what reason some landed +estates may not be held otherwise than by inheritance. Can any +philosophic spoiler undertake to demonstrate the positive or the +comparative evil of having a certain, and that, too, a large, portion of +landed property passing in succession through persons whose title to it +is, always in theory and often in fact, an eminent degree of piety, +morals, and learning; a property which by its destination, in their +turn, and on the score of merit, gives to the noblest families +renovation and support, to the lowest the means of dignity and +elevation; a property, the tenure of which is the performance of some +duty, (whatever value you may choose to set upon that duty,) and the +character of whose proprietors demands at least an exterior decorum and +gravity of manners,—who are to exercise a generous, but temperate +hospitality,—part of whose income they are to consider as a trust for +charity,—and who, even when they fail in their trust, when they slide +from their character, and degenerate into a mere common secular nobleman +or gentleman, are in no respect worse than those who may succeed them in +their forfeited possessions? Is it better that estates should be held by +those who have no duty than by those who have one? by those whose +character and destination point to virtues than by those who have no +rule and direction in the expenditure of their estates but their own +will <a name="Page_449" id="Page_449" title="449" class="pagenum"></a>and appetite? Nor are these estates held altogether in the +character or with the evils supposed inherent in mortmain. They pass +from hand to hand with a more rapid circulation than any other. No +excess is good, and therefore too great a proportion of landed property +may be held officially for life; but it does not seem to me of material +injury to any common wealth that there should exist some estates that +have a chance of being acquired by other means than the previous +acquisition of money.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>This letter is grown to a great length, though it is, indeed, short with +regard to the infinite extent of the subject. Various avocations have +from time to time called my mind from the subject. I was not sorry to +give myself leisure to observe whether in the proceedings of the +National Assembly I might not find reasons to change or to qualify some +of my first sentiments. Everything has confirmed me more strongly in my +first opinions. It was my original purpose to take a view of the +principles of the National Assembly with regard to the great and +fundamental establishments, and to compare the whole of what you have +substituted in the place of what you have destroyed with the several +members of our British Constitution. But this plan is of greater extent +than at first I computed, and I find that you have little desire to take +the advantage of any examples. At present I must content myself with +some remarks upon your establishments, reserving for another time what I +proposed to say concerning the spirit of our British monarchy, +aristocracy, and democracy, as practically they exist.</p> + +<p>I have taken a view of what has been done by the <a name="Page_450" id="Page_450" title="450" class="pagenum"></a>governing power in +France. I have certainly spoke of it with freedom. Those whose principle +it is to despise the ancient, permanent sense of mankind, and to set up +a scheme of society on new principles, must naturally expect that such +of us who think better of the judgment of the human race than, of theirs +should consider both them and their devices as men and schemes upon +their trial. They must take it for granted that we attend much to their +reason, but not at all to their authority. They have not one of the +great influencing prejudices of mankind in their favor. They avow their +hostility to opinion. Of course they must expect no support from that +influence, which, with every other authority, they have deposed from the +seat of its jurisdiction.</p> + +<p>I can never consider this Assembly as anything else than a voluntary +association of men who have availed themselves of circumstances to seize +upon the power of the state. They have not the sanction and authority of +the character under which they first met. They have assumed another of a +very different nature, and have completely altered and inverted all the +relations in which they originally stood. They do not hold the authority +they exercise under any constitutional law of the state. They have +departed from the instructions of the people by whom they were sent; +which instructions, as the Assembly did not act in virtue of any ancient +usage or settled law, were the sole source of their authority. The most +considerable of their acts have not been done by great majorities; and +in this sort of near divisions, which carry only the constructive +authority of the whole, strangers will consider reasons as well as +resolutions.<a name="Page_451" id="Page_451" title="451" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>If they had set up this new, experimental government as a necessary +substitute for an expelled tyranny, mankind would anticipate the time of +prescription, which through long usage mellows into legality governments +that were violent in their commencement. All those who have affections +which lead them to the conservation of civil order would recognize, even +in its cradle, the child as legitimate, which has been produced from +those principles of cogent expediency to which all just governments owe +their birth, and on which they justify their continuance. But they will +be late and reluctant in giving any sort of countenance to the +operations of a power which has derived its birth from no law and no +necessity, but which, on the contrary, has had its origin in those vices +and sinister practices by which the social union is often disturbed and +sometimes destroyed. This Assembly has hardly a year's prescription. We +have their own word for it that they have made a revolution. To make a +revolution is a measure which, <i>primâ fronte</i>, requires an apology. To +make a revolution is to subvert the ancient state of our country; and no +common reasons are called for to justify so violent a proceeding. The +sense of mankind authorizes us to examine into the mode of acquiring new +power, and to criticize on the use that is made of it, with less awe and +reverence than that which is usually conceded to a settled and +recognized authority.</p> + +<p>In obtaining and securing their power, the Assembly proceeds upon +principles the most opposite from those which appear to direct them in +the use of it. An observation on this difference will let us into the +true spirit of their conduct. Everything which they <a name="Page_452" id="Page_452" title="452" class="pagenum"></a>have done, or +continue to do, in order to obtain and keep their power, is by the most +common arts. They proceed exactly as their ancestors of ambition have +done before them. Trace them through all their artifices, frauds, and +violences, you can find nothing at all that is new. They follow +precedents and examples with the punctilious exactness of a pleader. +They never depart an iota from the authentic formulas of tyranny and +usurpation. But in all the regulations relative to the public good the +spirit has been the very reverse of this. There they commit the whole to +the mercy of untried speculations; they abandon the dearest interests of +the public to those loose theories to which none of them would choose to +trust the slightest of his private concerns. They make this difference, +because in their desire of obtaining and securing power they are +thoroughly in earnest; there they travel in the beaten road. The public +interests, because about them they have no real solicitude, they abandon +wholly to chance: I say to chance, because their schemes have nothing in +experience to prove their tendency beneficial.</p> + +<p>We must always see with a pity not unmixed with respect the errors of +those who are timid and doubtful of themselves with regard to points +wherein the happiness of mankind is concerned. But in these gentlemen +there is nothing of the tender parental solicitude which fears to cut up +the infant for the sake of an experiment. In the vastness of their +promises and the confidence of their predictions they far outdo all the +boasting of empirics. The arrogance of their pretensions in a manner +provokes and challenges us to an inquiry into their foundation.<a name="Page_453" id="Page_453" title="453" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>I am convinced that there are men of considerable parts among the +popular leaders in the National Assembly. Some of them display eloquence +in their speeches and their writings. This cannot be without powerful +and cultivated talents. But eloquence may exist without a proportionable +degree of wisdom. When I speak of ability, I am obliged to distinguish. +What they have done towards the support of their system bespeaks no +ordinary men. In the system itself, taken as the scheme of a republic +constructed for procuring the prosperity and security of the citizen, +and for promoting the strength and grandeur of the state, I confess +myself unable to find out anything which displays, in a single instance, +the work of a comprehensive and disposing mind, or even the provisions +of a vulgar prudence. Their purpose everywhere seems to have been to +evade and slip aside from <i>difficulty</i>. This it has been the glory of +the great masters in all the arts to confront, and to overcome,—and +when they had overcome the first difficulty, to turn it into an +instrument for new conquests over new difficulties: thus to enable them +to extend the empire of their science, and even to push forward, beyond +the reach of their original thoughts, the landmarks of the human +understanding itself. Difficulty is a severe instructor, set over us by +the supreme ordinance of a parental Guardian and Legislator, who knows +us better than we know ourselves, as He loves us better too. <i>Pater ipse +colendi haud facilem esse viam voluit</i>. He that wrestles with us +strengthens our nerves and sharpens our skill. Our antagonist is our +helper. This amicable conflict with difficulty obliges us to an intimate +acquaintance with our object, and compels us to consider it in all its +re<a name="Page_454" id="Page_454" title="454" class="pagenum"></a>lations. It will not suffer us to be superficial. It is the want of +nerves of understanding for such a task, it is the degenerate fondness +for tricking short-outs and little fallacious facilities, that has in so +many parts of the world created governments with arbitrary powers. They +have created the late arbitrary monarchy of France. They have created +the arbitrary republic of Paris. With them defects in wisdom are to be +supplied by the plenitude of force. They get nothing by it. Commencing +their labors on a principle of sloth, they have the common fortune of +slothful men. The difficulties, which they rather had eluded than +escaped, meet them again in their course; they multiply and thicken on +them; they are involved, through a labyrinth of confused detail, in an +industry without limit and without direction; and in conclusion, the +whole of their work becomes feeble, vicious, and insecure.</p> + +<p>It is this inability to wrestle with difficulty which has obliged the +arbitrary Assembly of France to commence their schemes of reform with +abolition and total destruction.<a name="FNanchor_120_121" id="FNanchor_120_121"></a><a href="#Footnote_120_121" class="fnanchor" title=" A leading member of the Assembly, M. Rabaut de St. +Étienne, has expressed the principle of all their proceedings as clearly +as possible; nothing can be more simple:—"_Tous les établissemens en +France couronnent le malheur du peuple: pour le rendre heureux, il faut +le renouveler, changer ses idées, changer ses loix, changer ses mœurs, +... changer les hommes, changer les choses, changer ses mots, ... tout +détruire; oui, tout détruire; puisque tout est à récréer_."—This +gentleman was chosen president in an assembly not sitting at +_Quinze-Vingt_ or the _Petites Maisons_, and composed of persons giving +themselves out to be rational beings; but neither his ideas, language, +or conduct differ in the smallest degree from the discourses, opinions, +and actions of those, within and without the Assembly, who direct the +operations of the machine now at work in France.">[120]</a> But is it in destroying and +pulling down that skill is displayed? Your mob can do <a name="Page_455" id="Page_455" title="455" class="pagenum"></a>this as well at +least as your assemblies. The shallowest understanding, the rudest hand, +is more than equal to that task. Rage and frenzy will pull down more in +half an hour than prudence, deliberation, and foresight can build up in +a hundred years. The errors and defects of old establishments are +visible and palpable. It calls for little ability to point them out; and +where absolute power is given, it requires but a word wholly to abolish +the vice and the establishment together. The same lazy, but restless +disposition, which loves sloth and hates quiet, directs these +politicians, when they come to work for supplying the place of what they +have destroyed. To make everything the reverse of what they have seen is +quite as easy as to destroy. No difficulties occur in what has never +been tried. Criticism is almost baffled in discovering the defects of +what has not existed; and eager enthusiasm and cheating hope have all +the wide field of imagination, in which they may expatiate with little +or no opposition.</p> + +<p>At once to preserve and to reform is quite another thing. When the +useful parts of an old establishment are kept, and what is superadded is +to be fitted to what is retained, a vigorous mind, steady, persevering +attention, various powers of comparison and combination, and the +resources of an understanding fruitful in expedients are to be +exercised; they are to be exercised in a continued conflict with the +combined force of opposite vices, with the obstinacy that rejects all +improvement, and the levity that is fatigued and disgusted with +everything of which it is in possession. But you may object,—"A process +of this kind is slow. It is not fit for an Assembly which glories in +performing in a few months the work of <a name="Page_456" id="Page_456" title="456" class="pagenum"></a>ages. Such a mode of reforming, +possibly, might take up many years." Without question it might; and it +ought. It is one of the excellences of a method in which time is amongst +the assistants, that its operation is slow, and in some cases almost +imperceptible. If circumspection and caution are a part of wisdom, when +we work only upon inanimate matter, surely they become a part of duty +too, when the subject of our demolition and construction is not brick +and timber, but sentient beings, by the sudden alteration of whose +state, condition, and habits, multitudes may be rendered miserable. But +it seems as if it were the prevalent opinion in Paris, that an unfeeling +heart and an undoubting confidence are the sole qualifications for a +perfect legislator. Far different are my ideas of that high office. The +true lawgiver ought to have a heart full of sensibility. He ought to +love and respect his kind, and to fear himself. It may be allowed to his +temperament to catch his ultimate object with an intuitive glance; but +his movements towards it ought to be deliberate. Political arrangement, +as it is a work for social ends, is to be only wrought by social means. +There mind must conspire with mind. Time is required to produce that +union of minds which alone can produce all the good we aim at. Our +patience will achieve more than our force. If I might venture to appeal +to what is so much out of fashion in Paris,—I mean to experience,—I +should tell you, that in my course I have known, and, according to my +measure, have coöperated with great men; and I have never yet seen any +plan which has not been mended by the observations of those who were +much inferior in understanding to the person who took the lead in the +business. By a <a name="Page_457" id="Page_457" title="457" class="pagenum"></a>slow, but well-sustained progress, the effect of each +step is watched; the good or ill success of the first gives light to us +in the second; and so, from light to light, we are conducted with safety +through the whole series. We see that the parts of the system do not +clash. The evils latent in the most promising contrivances are provided +for as they arise. One advantage is as little as possible sacrificed to +another. We compensate, we reconcile, we balance. We are enabled to +unite into a consistent whole the various anomalies and contending +principles that are found in the minds and affairs of men. From hence +arises, not an excellence in simplicity, but one far superior, an +excellence in composition. Where the great interests of mankind are +concerned through a long succession of generations, that succession +ought to be admitted into some share in the councils which are so deeply +to affect them. If justice requires this, the work itself requires the +aid of more minds than one age can furnish. It is from this view of +things that the best legislators have been often satisfied with the +establishment of some sure, solid, and ruling principle in +government,—a power like that which some of the philosophers have +called a plastic Nature; and having fixed the principle, they have left +it afterwards to its own operation.</p> + +<p>To proceed in this manner, that is, to proceed with a presiding +principle and a prolific energy, is with me the criterion of profound +wisdom. What your politicians think the marks of a bold, hardy genius +are only proofs of a deplorable want of ability. By their violent haste, +and their defiance of the process of Nature, they are delivered over +blindly to every projector and adventurer, to every alchemist and +em<a name="Page_458" id="Page_458" title="458" class="pagenum"></a>piric. They despair of turning to account anything that is common. +Diet is nothing in their system of remedy. The worst of it is, that this +their despair of curing common distempers by regular methods arises not +only from defect of comprehension, but, I fear, from some malignity of +disposition. Your legislators seem to have taken their opinions of all +professions, ranks, and offices from the declamations and buffooneries +of satirists,—who would themselves be astonished, if they were held to +the letter of their own descriptions. By listening only to these, your +leaders regard all things only on the side of their vices and faults, +and view those vices and faults under every color of exaggeration. It is +undoubtedly true, though it may seem paradoxical,—but, in general, +those who are habitually employed in finding and displaying faults are +unqualified for the work of reformation; because their minds are not +only unfurnished with patterns of the fair and good, but by habit they +come to take no delight in the contemplation of those things. By hating +vices too much, they come to love men too little. It is therefore not +wonderful that they should be indisposed and unable to serve them. From +hence arises the complexional disposition of some of your guides to pull +everything in pieces. At this malicious game they display the whole of +their <i>quadrimanous</i> activity. As to the rest, the paradoxes of eloquent +writers, brought forth purely as a sport of fancy, to try their talents, +to rouse attention, and excite surprise, are taken up by these +gentlemen, not in the spirit of the original authors, as means of +cultivating their taste and improving their style: these paradoxes +become with them serious grounds of action, upon which they proceed in +<a name="Page_459" id="Page_459" title="459" class="pagenum"></a>regulating the most important concerns of the state. Cicero ludicrously +describes Cato as endeavoring to act in the commonwealth upon the school +paradoxes which exercised the wits of the junior students in the Stoic +philosophy. If this was true of Cato, these gentlemen copy after him in +the manner of some persons who lived about his time,—<i>pede nudo +Catonem</i>. Mr. Hume told me that he had from Rousseau himself the secret +of his principles of composition. That acute, though eccentric observer, +had perceived, that, to strike and interest the public, the marvellous +must be produced; that the marvellous of the heathen mythology had long +since lost its effects; that giants, magicians, fairies, and heroes of +romance, which succeeded, had exhausted the portion of credulity which +belonged to their age; that now nothing was left to a writer but that +species of the marvellous, which might still be produced, and with as +great an effect as ever, though in another way,—that is, the marvellous +in life, in manners, in characters, and in extraordinary situations, +giving rise to new and unlooked-for strokes in politics and morals. I +believe, that, were Rousseau alive, and in one of his lucid intervals, +he would be shocked at the practical frenzy of his scholars, who in +their paradoxes are servile imitators, and even in their incredulity +discover an implicit faith.</p> + +<p>Men who undertake considerable things, even in a regular way, ought to +give us ground to presume ability. But the physician of the state, who, +not satisfied with the cure of distempers, undertakes to regenerate +constitutions, ought to show uncommon powers. Some very unusual +appearances of wisdom ought to display themselves on the face of the +designs of those who appeal to no practice and who copy <a name="Page_460" id="Page_460" title="460" class="pagenum"></a>after no model. +Has any such been manifested? I shall take a view (it shall for the +subject be a very short one) of what the Assembly has done, with regard, +first, to the constitution of the legislature; in the next place, to +that of the executive power; then to that of the judicature; afterwards +to the model of the army; and conclude with the system of finance: to +see whether we can discover in any part of their schemes the portentous +ability which may justify these bold undertakers in the superiority +which they assume over mankind.</p> + +<p>It is in the model of the sovereign and presiding part of this new +republic that we should expect their grand display. Here they were to +prove their title to their proud demands. For the plan itself at large, +and for the reasons on which it is grounded, I refer to the journals of +the Assembly of the 29th of September, 1789, and to the subsequent +proceedings which have made any alterations in the plan. So far as in a +matter somewhat confused I can see light, the system remains +substantially as it has been originally framed. My few remarks will be +such as regard its spirit, its tendency, and its fitness for framing a +popular commonwealth, which they profess theirs to be, suited to the +ends for which any commonwealth, and particularly such a commonwealth, +is made. At the same time I mean to consider its consistency with itself +and its own principles.</p> + +<p>Old establishments are tried by their effects. If the people are happy, +united, wealthy, and powerful, we presume the rest. We conclude that to +be good from whence good is derived. In old establishments various +correctives have been found for their aberrations from theory. Indeed, +they are the results of va<a name="Page_461" id="Page_461" title="461" class="pagenum"></a>rious necessities and expediences. They are +not often constructed after any theory: theories are rather drawn from +them. In them we often see the end best obtained, where the means seem +not perfectly reconcilable to what we may fancy was the original scheme. +The means taught by experience may be better suited to political ends +than those contrived in the original project. They again react upon the +primitive constitution, and sometimes improve the design itself, from +which they seem to have departed. I think all this might be curiously +exemplified in the British Constitution. At worst, the errors and +deviations of every kind in reckoning are found and computed, and the +ship proceeds in her course. This is the case of old establishments; but +in a new and merely theoretic system, it is expected that every +contrivance shall appear, on the face of it, to answer its ends, +especially where the projectors are no way embarrassed with an endeavor +to accommodate the new building to an old one, either in the walls or on +the foundations.</p> + +<p>The French builders, clearing away as mere rubbish whatever they found, +and, like their ornamental gardeners, forming everything into an exact +level, propose to rest the whole local and general legislature on three +bases of three different kinds,—one geometrical, one arithmetical, and +the third financial; the first of which they call <i>the basis of +territory</i>; the second, <i>the basis of population</i>; and the third, <i>the +basis of contribution</i>. For the accomplishment of the first of these +purposes, they divide the area of their country into eighty-three +pieces, regularly square, of eighteen leagues by eighteen. These large +divisions are called <i>Departments</i>. These they portion, proceed<a name="Page_462" id="Page_462" title="462" class="pagenum"></a>ing by +square measurement, into seventeen hundred and twenty districts, called +<i>Communes</i>. These again they subdivide, still proceeding by square +measurement, into smaller districts, called <i>Cantons</i>, making in all +6,400.</p> + +<p>At first view this geometrical basis of theirs presents not much to +admire or to blame. It calls for no great legislative talents. Nothing +more than an accurate land-surveyor, with his chain, sight, and +theodolite, is requisite for such a plan as this. In the old divisions +of the country, various accidents at times, and the ebb and flow of +various properties and jurisdictions, settled their bounds. These bounds +were not made upon any fixed system, undoubtedly. They were subject to +some inconveniences; but they were inconveniences for which use had +found remedies, and habit had supplied accommodation and patience. In +this new pavement of square within square, and this organization and +semi-organization, made on the system of Empedocles and Buffon, and not +upon any politic principle, it is impossible that innumerable local +inconveniences, to which men are not habituated, must not arise. But +these I pass over, because it requires an accurate knowledge of the +country, which I do not possess, to specify them.</p> + +<p>When these state surveyors came to take a view of their work of +measurement, they soon found that in politics the most fallacious of all +things was geometrical demonstration. They had then recourse to another +basis (or rather buttress) to support the building, which tottered on +that false foundation. It was evident that the goodness of the soil, the +number of the people, their wealth, and the largeness of their +contribution, made such infinite variations be<a name="Page_463" id="Page_463" title="463" class="pagenum"></a>tween square and square +as to render mensuration a ridiculous standard of power in the +commonwealth, and equality in geometry the most unequal of all measures +in the distribution of men. However, they could not give it up,—but, +dividing their political and civil representation into three parts, they +allotted one of those parts to the square measurement, without a single +fact or calculation to ascertain whether this territorial proportion of +representation was fairly assigned, and ought upon any principle really +to be a third. Having, however, given to geometry this portion, (of a +third for her dower,) out of compliment, I suppose, to that sublime +science, they left the other two to be scuffled for between the other +parts, population and contribution.</p> + +<p>When they came to provide for population, they were not able to proceed +quite so smoothly as they had done in the field of their geometry. Here +their arithmetic came to bear upon their juridical metaphysics. Had they +stuck to their metaphysic principles, the arithmetical process would be +simple indeed. Men, with them, are strictly equal, and are entitled to +equal rights in their own government. Each head, on this system, would +have its vote, and every man would vote directly for the person who was +to represent him in the legislature. "But soft,—by regular degrees, not +yet." This metaphysic principle, to which law, custom, usage, policy, +reason, were to yield, is to yield itself to their pleasure. There must +be many degrees, and some stages, before the representative can come in +contact with his constituent. Indeed, as we shall soon see, these two +persons are to have no sort of communion with each other. First, the +voters in the <i>Canton</i>, who compose <a name="Page_464" id="Page_464" title="464" class="pagenum"></a>what they call <i>primary +assemblies</i>, are to have a <i>qualification</i>. What! a qualification on the +indefeasible rights of men? Yes; but it shall be a very small +qualification. Our injustice shall be very little oppressive: only the +local valuation of three days' labor paid to the public. Why, this is +not much, I readily admit, for anything but the utter subversion of your +equalizing principle. As a qualification it might as well be let alone; +for it answers no one purpose for which qualifications are established; +and, on your ideas, it excludes from a vote the man of all others whose +natural equality stands the most in need of protection and defence: I +mean the man who has nothing else but his natural equality to guard him. +You order him to buy the right which you before told him Nature had +given to him gratuitously at his birth, and of which no authority on +earth could lawfully deprive him. With regard to the person who cannot +come up to your market, a tyrannous aristocracy, as against him, is +established at the very outset, by you who pretend to be its sworn foe.</p> + +<p>The gradation proceeds. These primary assemblies of the <i>Canton</i> elect +deputies to the <i>Commune</i>,—one for every two hundred qualified +inhabitants. Here is the first medium put between the primary elector +and the representative legislator; and here a new turnpike is fixed for +taxing the rights of men with a second qualification: for none can be +elected into the <i>Commune</i> who does not pay the amount of ten days' +labor. Nor have we yet done. There is still to be another +gradation.<a name="FNanchor_121_122" id="FNanchor_121_122"></a><a href="#Footnote_121_122" class="fnanchor" title=" The Assembly, in executing the plan of their committee, +made some alterations. They have struck out one stage in these +gradations; this removes a part of the objection; but the main +objection, namely, that in their scheme the first constituent voter has +no connection with the representative legislator, remains in all its +force. There are other alterations, some possibly for the better, some +certainly for the worse: but to the author the merit or demerit of these +smaller alterations appears to be of no moment, where the scheme itself +is fundamentally vicious and absurd.">[121]</a> These <i>Communes</i>, chosen by the <i>Canton</i>, <a name="Page_465" id="Page_465" title="465" class="pagenum"></a>choose to the +<i>Department</i>; and the deputies of the <i>Department</i> choose their deputies +to the <i>National Assembly</i>. Here is a third barrier of a senseless +qualification. Every deputy to the National Assembly must pay, in direct +contribution, to the value of a <i>mark of silver</i>. Of all these +qualifying barriers we must think alike: that they are impotent to +secure independence, strong only to destroy the rights of men.</p> + +<p>In all this process, which in its fundamental elements affects to +consider only <i>population</i>, upon a principle of natural right, there is +a manifest attention to <i>property</i>,—which, however just and reasonable +on other schemes, is on theirs perfectly unsupportable.</p> + +<p>When they come to their third basis, that of <i>Contribution</i>, we find +that they have more completely lost sight of the rights of men. This +last basis rests <i>entirely</i> on property. A principle totally different +from the equality of men, and utterly irreconcilable to it, is thereby +admitted: but no sooner is this principle admitted than (as usual) it is +subverted; and it is not subverted (as we shall presently see) to +approximate the inequality of riches to the level of Nature. The +additional share in the third portion of representation (a portion +reserved exclusively for the higher contribution) is made to regard the +<i>district</i> only, and not the individuals in it who pay. It is easy to +perceive, by the course of their reasonings, how much they were +embarrassed by their contra<a name="Page_466" id="Page_466" title="466" class="pagenum"></a>dictory ideas of the rights of men and the +privileges of riches. The Committee of Constitution do as good as admit +that they are wholly irreconcilable. "The relation with regard to the +contributions is without doubt <i>null</i>, (say they,) when the question is +on the balance of the political rights as between individual and +individual; without which <i>personal equality would be destroyed</i>, and +<i>an aristocracy of the rich</i> would be established. But this +inconvenience entirely disappears, when the proportional relation of the +contribution is only considered in the <i>great masses</i>, and is solely +between province and province; it serves in that case only to form a +just reciprocal proportion between the cities, without affecting the +personal rights of the citizens."</p> + +<p>Here the principle of <i>contribution</i>, as taken between man and man, is +reprobated as <i>null</i>, and destructive to equality,—and as pernicious, +too, because it leads to the establishment of an <i>aristocracy of the +rich</i>. However, it must not be abandoned. And the way of getting rid of +the difficulty is to establish the inequality as between department and +department, leaving all the individuals in each department upon an exact +par. Observe, that this parity between individuals had been before +destroyed, when the qualifications within the departments were settled; +nor does it seem a matter of great importance whether the equality of +men be injured by masses or individually. An individual is not of the +same importance in a mass represented by a few as in a mass represented +by many. It would be too much to tell a man jealous of his equality, +that the elector has the same franchise who votes for three members as +he who votes for ten.<a name="Page_467" id="Page_467" title="467" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>Now take it in the other point of view, and let us suppose their +principle of representation according to contribution, that is according +to riches, to be well imagined, and to be a necessary basis for their +republic. In this their third basis they assume that riches ought to be +respected, and that justice and policy require that they should entitle +men, in some mode or other, to a larger share in the administration of +public affairs; it is now to be seen how the Assembly provides for the +preëminence, or even for the security of the rich, by conferring, in +virtue of their opulence, that larger measure of power to their district +which is denied to them personally. I readily admit (indeed, I should +lay it down as a fundamental principle) that in a republican government, +which has a democratic basis, the rich do require an additional security +above what is necessary to them in monarchies. They are subject to envy, +and through envy to oppression. On the present scheme it is impossible +to divine what advantage they derive from the aristocratic preference +upon which the unequal representation of the masses is founded. The rich +cannot feel it, either as a support to dignity or as security to +fortune: for the aristocratic mass is generated from purely democratic +principles; and the prevalence given to it in the general representation +has no sort of reference to or connection with the persons upon account +of whose property this superiority of the mass is established. If the +contrivers of this scheme meant any sort of favor to the rich, in +consequence of their contribution, they ought to have conferred the +privilege either on the individual rich, or on some class formed of rich +persons (as historians represent Servius Tullius to have done in the +early <a name="Page_468" id="Page_468" title="468" class="pagenum"></a>constitution of Rome); because the contest between the rich and +the poor is not a struggle between corporation and corporation, but a +contest between men and men,—a competition, not between districts, but +between descriptions. It would answer its purpose better, if the scheme +were inverted: that the votes of the masses were rendered equal, and +that the votes within each mass were proportioned to property.</p> + +<p>Let us suppose one man in a district (it is an easy supposition) to +contribute as much as a hundred of his neighbors. Against these he has +but one vote. If there were but one representative for the mass, his +poor neighbors would outvote him by an hundred to one for that single +representative. Bad enough! But amends are to be made him. How? The +district, in virtue of his wealth, is to choose, say ten members instead +of one: that is to say, by paying a very large contribution he has the +happiness of being outvoted, an hundred to one, by the poor, for ten +representatives, instead of being outvoted exactly in the same +proportion for a single member. In truth, instead of benefiting by this +superior quantity of representation, the rich man is subjected to an +additional hardship. The increase of representation within his province +sets up nine persons more, and as many more than nine as there may be +democratic candidates, to cabal and intrigue and to flatter the people +at his expense and to his oppression. An interest is by this means held +out to multitudes of the inferior sort, in obtaining a salary of +eighteen livres a day, (to them a vast object,) besides the pleasure of +a residence in Paris, and their share in the government of the kingdom. +The more the objects of ambition are multiplied and become democratic, +just in that proportion the rich are endangered.<a name="Page_469" id="Page_469" title="469" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>Thus it must fare between the poor and the rich in the province deemed +aristocratic, which in its internal relation is the very reverse of that +character. In its external relation, that is, in its relation to the +other provinces, I cannot see how the unequal representation which is +given to masses on account of wealth becomes the means of preserving the +equipoise and the tranquillity of the commonwealth. For, if it be one of +the objects to secure the weak from being crushed by the strong, (as in +all society undoubtedly it is,) how are the smaller and poorer of these +masses to be saved from the tyranny of the more wealthy? Is it by adding +to the wealthy further and more systematical means of oppressing them? +When we come to a balance of representation between corporate bodies, +provincial interests, emulations, and jealousies are full as likely to +arise among them as among individuals; and their divisions are likely to +produce a much hotter spirit of dissension, and something leading much +more nearly to a war.</p> + +<p>I see that these aristocratic masses are made upon what is called the +principle of direct contribution. Nothing can be a more unequal standard +than this. The indirect contribution, that which arises from duties on +consumption, is in truth a better standard, and follows and discovers +wealth more naturally than this of direct contribution. It is difficult, +indeed, to fix a standard of local preference on account of the one, or +of the other, or of both, because some provinces may pay the more of +either or of both on account of causes not intrinsic, but originating +from those very districts over whom they have obtained a preference in +consequence of their ostensible contribution.<a name="Page_470" id="Page_470" title="470" class="pagenum"></a> If the masses were +independent, sovereign bodies, who were to provide for a federative +treasury by distinct contingents, and that the revenue had not (as it +has) many impositions running through the whole, which affect men +individually, and not corporately, and which, by their nature, confound +all territorial limits, something might be said for the basis of +contribution as founded on masses. But, of all things, this +representation, to be measured by contribution, is the most difficult to +settle upon principles of equity in a country which considers its +districts as members of a whole. For a great city, such as Bordeaux or +Paris, appears to pay a vast body of duties, almost out of all +assignable proportion to other places, and its mass is considered +accordingly. But are these cities the true contributors in that +proportion? No. The consumers of the commodities imported into Bordeaux, +who are scattered through all France, pay the import duties of Bordeaux. +The produce of the vintage in Guienne and Languedoc give to that city +the means of its contribution growing out of an export commerce. The +landholders who spend their estates in Paris, and are thereby the +creators of that city, contribute for Paris from the provinces out of +which their revenues arise. Very nearly the same arguments will apply to +the representative share given on account of <i>direct</i> contribution: +because the direct contribution must be assessed on wealth, real or +presumed; and that local wealth will itself arise from causes not local, +and which therefore in equity ought not to produce a local preference.</p> + +<p>It is very remarkable, that, in this fundamental regulation which +settles the representation of the mass upon the direct contribution, +they have not yet <a name="Page_471" id="Page_471" title="471" class="pagenum"></a>settled how that direct contribution shall be laid, +and how apportioned. Perhaps there is some latent policy towards the +continuance of the present Assembly in this strange procedure. However, +until they do this, they can have no certain constitution. It must +depend at last upon the system of taxation, and must vary with every +variation in that system. As they have contrived matters, their taxation +does not so much depend on their constitution as their constitution on +their taxation. This must introduce great confusion among the masses; as +the variable qualification for votes within the district must, if ever +real contested elections take place, cause infinite internal +controversies.</p> + +<p>To compare together the three bases, not on their political reason, but +on the ideas on which the Assembly works, and to try its consistency +with itself, we cannot avoid observing that the principle which the +committee call the basis of <i>population</i> does not begin to operate from +the same point with the two other principles, called the bases of +<i>territory</i> and of <i>contribution</i>, which are both of an aristocratic +nature. The consequence is, that, where all three begin to operate +together, there is the most absurd inequality produced by the operation +of the former on the two latter principles. Every canton contains four +square leagues, and is estimated to contain, on the average, 4,000 +inhabitants, or 680 voters in the <i>primary assemblies</i>, which vary in +numbers with the population of the canton, and send <i>one deputy</i> to the +<i>commune</i> for every 200 voters. <i>Nine cantons</i> make a <i>commune</i>.</p> + +<p>Now let us take <i>a canton</i> containing <i>a seaport town of trade</i>, or <i>a +great manufacturing town</i>. Let us sup<a name="Page_472" id="Page_472" title="472" class="pagenum"></a>pose the population of this canton +to be 12,700 inhabitants, or 2,193 voters, forming <i>three primary +assemblies</i>, and sending <i>ten deputies</i> to the <i>commune</i>.</p> + +<p>Oppose to this <i>one</i> canton <i>two</i> others of the remaining eight in the +same commune. These we may suppose to have their fair population, of +4,000 inhabitants, and 680 voters each, or 8,000 inhabitants and 1,360 +voters, both together. These will form only <i>two primary assemblies</i>, +and send only <i>six</i> deputies to the <i>commune</i>.</p> + +<p>When the assembly of the <i>commune</i> comes to vote on the <i>basis of +territory</i>, which principle is first admitted to operate in that +assembly, the <i>single canton</i>, which has <i>half</i> the territory of the +<i>other two</i>, will have <i>ten</i> voices to <i>six</i> in the election of <i>three +deputies</i> to the assembly of the department, chosen on the express +ground of a representation of territory. This inequality, striking as it +is, will be yet highly aggravated, if we suppose, as we fairly may, the +<i>several</i> other cantons of the <i>commune</i> to fall proportionally short of +the average population, as much as the <i>principal canton</i> exceeds it.</p> + +<p>Now as to <i>the basis of contribution</i>, which also is a principle +admitted first to operate in the assembly of the <i>commune</i>. Let us again +take <i>one</i> canton, such as is stated above. If the whole of the direct +contributions paid by a great trading or manufacturing town be divided +equally among the inhabitants, each individual will be found to pay much +more than an individual living in the country according to the same +average. The whole paid by the inhabitants of the former will be more +than the whole paid by the inhabitants of the latter,—we may fairly +assume one third more. Then the 12,700 inhabitants, or 2,193 <a name="Page_473" id="Page_473" title="473" class="pagenum"></a>voters of +the canton, will pay as much as 19,050 inhabitants, or 3,289 voters of +the <i>other cantons</i>, which are nearly the estimated proportion of +inhabitants and voters of <i>five</i> other cantons. Now the 2,193 voters +will, as I before said, send only <i>ten</i> deputies to the assembly; the +3,289 voters will send <i>sixteen</i>. Thus, for an <i>equal</i> share in the +contribution of the whole <i>commune</i>, there will be a difference of +<i>sixteen</i> voices to <i>ten</i> in voting for deputies to be chosen on the +principle of representing the general contribution of the whole +<i>commune</i>.</p> + +<p>By the same mode of computation, we shall find 15,875 inhabitants, or +2,741 voters of the <i>other</i> cantons, who pay <i>one sixth</i> LESS to the +contribution of the whole <i>commune</i>, will have <i>three</i> voices MORE than +the 12,700 inhabitants, or 2,193 voters of the <i>one</i> canton.</p> + +<p>Such is the fantastical and unjust inequality between mass and mass, in +this curious repartition of the rights of representation arising out of +<i>territory</i> and <i>contribution</i>. The qualifications which these confer +are in truth negative qualifications, that give a right in an inverse +proportion to the possession of them.</p> + +<p>In this whole contrivance of the three bases, consider it in any light +you please, I do not see a variety of objects reconciled in one +consistent whole, but several contradictory principles reluctantly and +irreconcilably brought and held together by your philosophers, like wild +beasts shut up in a cage, to claw and bite each other to their mutual +destruction.</p> + +<p>I am afraid I have gone too far into their way of considering the +formation of a Constitution. They have much, but bad, +metaphysics,—much, but bad, geometry,—much, but false, proportionate +arithmetic; but if it were all as exact as metaphysics, geome<a name="Page_474" id="Page_474" title="474" class="pagenum"></a>try, and +arithmetic ought to be, and if their schemes were perfectly consistent +in all their parts, it would make only a more fair and sightly vision. +It is remarkable, that, in a great arrangement of mankind, not one +reference whatsoever is to be found to anything moral or anything +politic,—nothing that relates to the concerns, the actions, the +passions, the interests of men. <i>Hominem non sapiunt</i>.</p> + +<p>You see I only consider this Constitution as electoral, and leading by +steps to the National Assembly. I do not enter into the internal +government of the departments, and their genealogy through the communes +and cantons. These local governments are, in the original plan, to be as +nearly as possible composed in the same manner and on the same +principles with the elective assemblies. They are each of them bodies +perfectly compact and rounded in themselves.</p> + +<p>You cannot but perceive in this scheme, that it has a direct and +immediate tendency to sever France into a variety of republics, and to +render them totally independent of each other, without any direct +constitutional means of coherence, connection, or subordination, except +what may be derived from their acquiescence in the determinations of the +general congress of the ambassadors from each independent republic. Such +in reality is the National Assembly; and such governments, I admit, do +exist in the world, though, in forms infinitely more suitable to the +local and habitual circumstances of their people. But such associations, +rather than bodies politic, have generally been the effect of necessity, +not choice; and I believe the present French power is the very first +body of citizens who, having obtained full authority to do with their +country what they pleased, have chosen to dissever it in this barbarous +manner.<a name="Page_475" id="Page_475" title="475" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>It is impossible not to observe, that, in the spirit of this geometrical +distribution and arithmetical arrangement, these pretended citizens +treat France exactly like a country of conquest. Acting as conquerors, +they have imitated the policy of the harshest of that harsh race. The +policy of such barbarous victors, who contemn a subdued people, and +insult their feelings, has ever been, as much as in them lay, to destroy +all vestiges of the ancient country, in religion, in polity, in laws, +and in manners; to confound all territorial limits; to produce a general +poverty; to put up their properties to auction; to crush their princes, +nobles, and pontiffs; to lay low everything which had lifted its head +above the level, or which could serve to combine or rally, in their +distresses, the disbanded people, under the standard of old opinion. +They have made France free in the manner in which those sincere friends +to the rights of mankind, the Romans, freed Greece, Macedon, and other +nations. They destroyed the bonds of their union, under color of +providing for the independence of each of their cities.</p> + +<p>When the members who compose these new bodies of cantons, communes, and +departments, arrangements purposely produced through the medium of +confusion, begin to act, they will find themselves in a great measure +strangers to one another. The electors and elected throughout, +especially in the rural <i>cantons</i>, will be frequently without any civil +habitudes or connections, or any of that natural discipline which is the +soul of a true republic. Magistrates and collectors of revenue are now +no longer acquainted with their districts, bishops with their dioceses, +or curates with their parishes. These new <a name="Page_476" id="Page_476" title="476" class="pagenum"></a>colonies of the rights of men +bear a strong resemblance to that sort of military colonies which +Tacitus has observed upon in the declining policy of Rome. In better and +wiser days (whatever course they took with foreign nations) they were +careful to make the elements of a methodical subordination and +settlement to be coeval, and even to lay the foundations of discipline +in the military.<a name="FNanchor_122_123" id="FNanchor_122_123"></a><a href="#Footnote_122_123" class="fnanchor" title=" "Non, ut olim, universæ legiones deducebantur, cum +tribunis, et centurionibus, et sui cujusque ordinis militibus, ut +consensu et caritate rempublicam efficerent; sed ignoti inter se, +diversis manipulis, sine rectore, sine affectibus mutuis, quasi ex alio +genere mortalium repente in unum collecti, numerus magis quam +colonia."—Tac. Annal. lib. 14, sect. 27.—All this will be still more +applicable to the unconnected, rotatory, biennial national assemblies, +in this absurd and senseless constitution.">[122]</a> But when all the good arts had fallen into ruin, +they proceeded, as your Assembly does, upon the equality of men, and +with as little judgment, and as little care for those things which make +a republic tolerable or durable. But in this, as well as almost every +instance, your new commonwealth is born and bred and fed in those +corruptions which mark degenerated and worn-out republics. Your child +comes into the world with the symptoms of death; the <i>facies +Hippocratica</i> forms the character of its physiognomy and the prognostic +of its fate.</p> + +<p>The legislators who framed the ancient republics knew that their +business was too arduous to be accomplished with no better apparatus +than the metaphysics of an undergraduate and the mathematics and +arithmetic of an exciseman. They had to do with men, and they were +obliged to study human nature. They had to do with citizens, and they +were obliged to study the effects of those habits which are +commu<a name="Page_477" id="Page_477" title="477" class="pagenum"></a>nicated by the circumstances of civil life. They were sensible +that the operation of this second nature on the first produced a new +combination,—and thence arose many diversities amongst men, according +to their birth, their education, their professions, the periods of their +lives, their residence in towns or in the country, their several ways of +acquiring and of fixing property, and according to the quality of the +property itself, all which rendered them, as it were, so many different +species of animals. From hence they thought themselves obliged to +dispose their citizens into such classes, and to place them in such +situations in the state, as their peculiar habits might qualify them to +fill, and to allot to them such appropriated privileges as might secure +to them what their specific occasions required, and which might furnish +to each description such force as might protect it in the conflict +caused by the diversity of interests that must exist, and must contend, +in all complex society: for the legislator would have been ashamed that +the coarse husbandman should well know how to assort and to use his +sheep, horses, and oxen, and should have enough of common sense not to +abstract and equalize them all into animals, without providing for each +kind an appropriate food, care, and employment,—whilst he, the +economist, disposer, and shepherd of his own kindred, subliming himself +into an airy metaphysician, was resolved to know nothing of his flocks +but as men in general. It is for this reason that Montesquieu observed, +very justly, that, in their classification of the citizens, the great +legislators of antiquity made the greatest display of their powers, and +even soared above themselves. It is here that your modern legislators +have gone deep into the negative se<a name="Page_478" id="Page_478" title="478" class="pagenum"></a>ries, and sunk even below their own +nothing. As the first sort of legislators attended to the different +kinds of citizens, and combined them into one commonwealth, the others, +the metaphysical and alchemistical legislators, have taken the directly +contrary course. They have attempted to confound all sorts of citizens, +as well as they could, into one homogeneous mass; and then they divided +this their amalgama into a number of incoherent republics. They reduce +men to loose counters, merely for the sake of simple telling, and not to +figures, whose power is to arise from their place in the table. The +elements of their own metaphysics might have taught them better lessons. +The troll of their categorical table might have informed them that there +was something else in the intellectual world besides <i>substance</i> and +<i>quantity</i>. They might learn from the catechism of metaphysics that +there were eight heads more,<a name="FNanchor_123_124" id="FNanchor_123_124"></a><a href="#Footnote_123_124" class="fnanchor" title=" Qualitas, Relatio, Actio, Passio, Ubi, Quando, Situs, +Habitus.">[123]</a> in every complex deliberation, which +they have never thought of; though these, of all the ten, are the +subject on which the skill of man can operate anything at all.</p> + +<p>So far from this able disposition of some of the old republican +legislators, which follows with a solicitous accuracy the moral +conditions and propensities of men, they have levelled and crushed +together all the orders which they found, even under the coarse, +unartificial arrangement of the monarchy, in which mode of government +the classing of the citizens is not of so much importance as in a +republic. It is true, however, that every such classification, if +properly ordered, is good in all forms of government, and composes a +strong barrier against the excesses of despotism, as well as it is the +necessary means of giving <a name="Page_479" id="Page_479" title="479" class="pagenum"></a>effect and permanence to a republic. For want +of something of this kind, if the present project of a republic should +fail, all securities to a moderated freedom fail along with it, all the +indirect restraints which mitigate despotism are removed; insomuch that, +if monarchy should ever again obtain an entire ascendency in France, +under this or any other dynasty, it will probably be, if not voluntarily +tempered, at setting out, by the wise and virtuous counsels of the +prince, the most completely arbitrary power that has ever appeared on +earth. This is to play a most desperate game.</p> + +<p>The confusion which attends on all such proceedings they even declare to +be one of their objects, and they hope to secure their Constitution by a +terror of a return of those evils which attended their making it. "By +this," say they, "its destruction will become difficult to authority, +which cannot break it up without the entire disorganization of the whole +state." They presume, that, if this authority should ever come to the +same degree of power that they have acquired, it would make a more +moderate and chastised use of it, and would piously tremble entirely to +disorganize the state in the savage manner that they have done. They +expect from the virtues of returning despotism the security which is to +be enjoyed by the offspring of their popular vices.</p> + +<p>I wish, Sir, that you and my readers would give an attentive perusal to +the work of M. de Calonne on this subject. It is, indeed, not only an +eloquent, but an able and instructive performance. I confine myself to +what he says relative to the Constitution of the new state, and to the +condition of the revenue. As to the disputes of this minister with his +rivals, I do <a name="Page_480" id="Page_480" title="480" class="pagenum"></a>not wish to pronounce upon them. As little do I mean to +hazard any opinion concerning his ways and means, financial or +political, for taking his country out of its present disgraceful and +deplorable situation of servitude, anarchy, bankruptcy, and beggary. I +cannot speculate quite so sanguinely as he does: but he is a Frenchman, +and has a closer duty relative to those objects, and better means of +judging of them, than I can have. I wish that the formal avowal which he +refers to, made by one of the principal leaders in the Assembly, +concerning the tendency of their scheme to bring France not only from a +monarchy to a republic, but from a republic to a mere confederacy, may +be very particularly attended to. It adds new force to my observations: +and, indeed, M. de Calonne's work supplies my deficiencies by many new +and striking arguments on most of the subjects of this letter.<a name="FNanchor_124_125" id="FNanchor_124_125"></a><a href="#Footnote_124_125" class="fnanchor" title=" See l'État de la France, p. 363.">[124]</a></p> + +<p>It is this resolution to break their country into separate republics +which has driven them into the greatest number of their difficulties and +contradictions. If it were not for this, all the questions of exact +equality, and these balances, never to be settled, of individual rights, +population, and contribution, would be wholly useless. The +representation, though derived from parts, would be a duty which equally +regarded the whole. Each deputy to the Assembly would be the +representative of France, and of all its descriptions, of the many and +of the few, of the rich and of the poor, of the great districts and of +the small. All these districts would themselves be subordinate to some +standing authority, existing independently of them,—an authority in +which their <a name="Page_481" id="Page_481" title="481" class="pagenum"></a>representation, and everything that belongs to it, +originated, and to which it was pointed. This standing, unalterable, +fundamental government would make, and it is the only thing which could +make, that territory truly and properly a whole. With us, when we elect +popular representatives, we send them to a council in which each man +individually is a subject, and submitted to a government complete in all +its ordinary functions. With you the elective Assembly is the sovereign, +and the sole sovereign; all the members are therefore integral parts of +this sole sovereignty. But with us it is totally different. With us the +representative, separated from the other parts, can have no action and +no existence. The government is the point of reference of the several +members and districts of our representation. This is the centre of our +unity. This government of reference is a trustee for the <i>whole</i>, and +not for the parts. So is the other branch of our public council: I mean +the House of Lords. With us the King and the Lords are several and joint +securities for the equality of each district, each province, each city. +When did you hear in Great Britain of any province suffering from the +inequality of its representation? what district from having no +representation at all? Not only our monarchy and our peerage secure the +equality on which our unity depends, but it is the spirit of the House +of Commons itself. The very inequality of representation, which is so +foolishly complained of, is perhaps the very thing which prevents us +from thinking or acting as members for districts. Cornwall elects as +many members as all Scotland. But is Cornwall better taken care of than +Scotland? Few trouble their heads about any of your bases, out of <a name="Page_482" id="Page_482" title="482" class="pagenum"></a>some +giddy clubs. Most of those who wish for any change, upon any plausible +grounds, desire it on different ideas.</p> + +<p>Your new Constitution is the very reverse of ours in its principle; and +I am astonished how any persons could dream of holding out anything done +in it as an example for Great Britain. With you there is little, or +rather no, connection between the last representative and the first +constituent. The member who goes to the National Assembly is not chosen +by the people, nor accountable to them. There are three elections before +he is chosen; two sets of magistracy intervene between him and the +primary assembly, so as to render him, as I have said, an ambassador of +a state, and not the representative of the people within a state. By +this the whole spirit of the election is changed; nor can any corrective +your Constitution-mongers have devised render him anything else than +what he is. The very attempt to do it would inevitably introduce a +confusion, if possible, more horrid than the present. There is no way to +make a connection between the original constituent and the +representative, but by the circuitous means which may lead the candidate +to apply in the first instance to the primary electors, in order that by +their authoritative instructions (and something more perhaps) these +primary electors may force the two succeeding bodies of electors to make +a choice agreeable to their wishes. But this would plainly subvert the +whole scheme. It would be to plunge them back into that tumult and +confusion of popular election, which, by their interposed gradation of +elections, they mean to avoid, and at length to risk the whole fortune +of the state with those who <a name="Page_483" id="Page_483" title="483" class="pagenum"></a>have the least knowledge of it and the +least interest in it. This is a perpetual dilemma, into which they are +thrown by the vicious, weak, and contradictory principles they have +chosen. Unless the people break up and level this gradation, it is plain +that they do not at all substantially elect to the Assembly; indeed, +they elect as little in appearance as reality.</p> + +<p>What is it we all seek for in an election? To answer its real purposes, +you must first possess the means of knowing the fitness of your man; and +then you must retain some hold upon him by personal obligation or +dependence. For what end are these primary electors complimented, or +rather mocked, with a choice? They can never know anything of the +qualities of him that is to serve them, nor has he any obligation +whatsoever to them. Of all the powers unfit to be delegated by those who +have any real means of judging, that most peculiarly unfit is what +relates to a <i>personal</i> choice. In case of abuse, that body of primary +electors never can call the representative to an account for his +conduct. He is too far removed from them in the chain of representation. +If he acts improperly at the end of his two years' lease, it does not +concern him for two years more. By the new French Constitution the best +and the wisest representatives go equally with the worst into this +<i>Limbus Patrum</i>. Their bottoms are supposed foul, and they must go into +dock to be refitted. Every man who has served in an Assembly is +ineligible for two years after. Just as these magistrates begin to learn +their trade, like chimney-sweepers, they are disqualified for exercising +it. Superficial, new, petulant acquisition, and interrupted, dronish, +broken, ill recollection, is to be the destined character <a name="Page_484" id="Page_484" title="484" class="pagenum"></a>of all your +future governors. Your Constitution has too much of jealousy to have +much of sense in it. You consider the breach of trust in the +representative so principally that you do not at all regard the question +of his fitness to execute it.</p> + +<p>This purgatory interval is not unfavorable to a faithless +representative, who may be as good a canvasser as he was a bad governor. +In this time he may cabal himself into a superiority over the wisest and +most virtuous. As, in the end, all the members of this elective +Constitution are equally fugitive, and exist only for the election, they +may be no longer the same persons who had chosen him, to whom he is to +be responsible when he solicits for a renewal of his trust. To call all +the secondary electors of the <i>commune</i> to account is ridiculous, +impracticable, and unjust: they may themselves have been deceived in +their choice, as the third set of electors, those of the <i>department</i>, +may be in theirs. In your elections responsibility cannot exist.</p> + +<p>Finding no sort of principle of coherence with each other in the nature +and constitution of the several new republics of France, I considered +what cement the legislators had provided for them from any extraneous +materials. Their confederations, their <i>spectacles</i>, their civic feasts, +and their enthusiasm I take no notice of; they are nothing but mere +tricks; but tracing their policy through their actions, I think I can +distinguish the arrangements by which they propose to hold these +republics together. The first is the <i>confiscation</i>, with the compulsory +paper currency annexed to it; the second is the supreme power of the +city of Paris; the third is the general army of the state. Of this last +I shall reserve what I have <a name="Page_485" id="Page_485" title="485" class="pagenum"></a>to say, until I come to consider the army +as an head by itself.</p> + +<p>As to the operation of the first (the confiscation and paper currency) +merely as a cement, I cannot deny that these, the one depending on the +other, may for some time compose some sort of cement, if their madness +and folly in the management, and in the tempering of the parts together, +does not produce a repulsion in the very outset. But allowing to the +scheme some coherence and some duration, it appears to me, that, if, +after a while, the confiscation should not be found sufficient to +support the paper coinage, (as I am morally certain it will not,) then, +instead of cementing, it will add infinitely to the dissociation, +distraction, and confusion of these confederate republics, both with +relation to each other and to the several parts within themselves. But +if the confiscation should so far succeed as to sink the paper currency, +the cement is gone with the circulation. In the mean time its binding +force will be very uncertain, and it will straiten or relax with every +variation in the credit of the paper.</p> + +<p>One thing only is certain in this scheme, which is an effect seemingly +collateral, but direct, I have no doubt, in the minds of those who +conduct this business; that is, its effect in producing an <i>oligarchy</i> +in every one of the republics. A paper circulation, not founded on any +real money deposited or engaged for, amounting already to four-and-forty +millions of English money, and this currency by force substituted in the +place of the coin of the kingdom, becoming thereby the substance of its +revenue, as well as the medium of all its commercial and civil +intercourse, must put the whole of what power, authority, and influence +<a name="Page_486" id="Page_486" title="486" class="pagenum"></a>is left, in any form whatsoever it may assume, into the hands of the +managers and conductors of this circulation.</p> + +<p>In England we feel the influence of the Bank, though it is only the +centre of a voluntary dealing. He knows little, indeed, of the influence +of money upon mankind, who does not see the force of the management of a +moneyed concern which is so much more extensive, and in its nature so +much more depending on the managers, than any of ours. But this is not +merely a money concern. There is another member in the system +inseparably connected with this money management. It consists in the +means of drawing out at discretion portions of the confiscated lands for +sale, and carrying on a process of continual transmutation of paper into +land and land into paper. When we follow this process in its effects, we +may conceive something of the intensity of the force with which this +system must operate. By this means the spirit of money-jobbing and +speculation goes into the mass of land itself, and incorporates with it. +By this kind of operation, that species of property becomes, as it were, +volatilized; it assumes an unnatural and monstrous activity, and thereby +throws into the hands of the several managers, principal and +subordinate, Parisian and provincial, all the representative of money, +and perhaps a full tenth part of all the land in France, which has now +acquired the worst and most pernicious part of the evil of a paper +circulation, the greatest possible uncertainty in its value. They have +reversed the Latonian kindness to the landed property of Delos. They +have sent theirs to be blown about, like the light fragments of a wreck, +<i>oras et littora circum</i>.<a name="Page_487" id="Page_487" title="487" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>The new dealers, being all habitually adventurers, and without any fixed +habits or local predilections, will purchase to job out again, as the +market of paper or of money or of land shall present an advantage. For +though a holy bishop thinks that agriculture will derive great +advantages from the "<i>enlightened</i>" usurers who are to purchase the +Church confiscations, I, who am not a good, but an old farmer, with +great humility beg leave to tell his late Lordship that usury is not a +tutor of agriculture; and if the word "enlightened" be understood +according to the new dictionary, as it always is in your new schools, I +cannot conceive how a man's not believing in God can teach him to +cultivate the earth with the least of any additional skill or +encouragement. "<i>Diis immortalibus sero</i>," said an old Roman, when he +held one handle of the plough, whilst Death held the other. Though you +were to join in the commission all the directors of the two Academies to +the directors of the <i>Caisse d'Escompte</i>, an old experienced peasant is +worth them all. I have got more information upon a curious and +interesting branch of husbandry, in one short conversation with an old +Carthusian monk, than I have derived from all the bank directors that I +have ever conversed with. However, there is no cause for apprehension +from the meddling of money-dealers with rural economy. These gentlemen +are too wise in their generation. At first, perhaps, their tender and +susceptible imaginations may be captivated with the innocent and +unprofitable delights of a pastoral life; but in a little time they will +find that agriculture is a trade much more laborious and much less +lucrative than that which they had left. After making its panegyric, +they will turn their backs on it, like their <a name="Page_488" id="Page_488" title="488" class="pagenum"></a>great precursor and +prototype. They may, like him, begin by singing, "<i>Beatus ille</i>"—but +what will be the end?</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Hæc ubi locutus fœnerator Alphius,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Jam jam futurus rusticus,<br /></span> +<span>Omnem relegit Idibus pecuniam,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Quærit Calendis ponere.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="noindent">They will cultivate the <i>Caisse d'Église</i>, under the sacred auspices of +this prelate, with much more profit than its vineyards and its +corn-fields. They will employ their talents according to their habits +and their interests. They will not follow the plough, whilst they can +direct treasuries and govern provinces.</p> + +<p>Your legislators, in everything new, are the very first who have founded +a commonwealth upon gaming, and infused this spirit into it as its vital +breath. The great object in these politics is to metamorphose France +from a great kingdom into one great play-table,—to turn its inhabitants +into a nation of gamesters,—to make speculation as extensive as +life,—to mix it with all its concerns,—and to divert the whole of the +hopes and fears of the people from their usual channels into the +impulses, passions, and superstitions of those who live on chances. They +loudly proclaim their opinion, that this their present system of a +republic cannot possibly exist without this kind of gaming fund, and +that the very thread of its life is spun out of the staple of these +speculations. The old gaming in funds was mischievous enough, +undoubtedly; but it was so only to individuals. Even when it had its +greatest extent, in the Mississippi and South Sea, it affected but few, +comparatively; where it extends further, as in lotteries, the spirit has +but a single object. But where the law, which in most cir<a name="Page_489" id="Page_489" title="489" class="pagenum"></a>cumstances +forbids, and in none countenances gaming, is itself debauched, so as to +reverse its nature and policy, and expressly to force the subject to +this destructive table, by bringing the spirit and symbols of gaming +into the minutest matters, and engaging everybody in it, and in +everything, a more dreadful epidemic distemper of that kind is spread +than yet has appeared in the world. With you a man can neither earn nor +buy his dinner without a speculation. What he receives in the morning +will not have the same value at night. What he is compelled to take as +pay for an old debt will not be received as the same, when he comes to +pay a debt contracted by himself; nor will it be the same, when by +prompt payment he would avoid contracting any debt at all. Industry must +wither away. Economy must be driven from your country. Careful provision +will have no existence. Who will labor without knowing the amount of his +pay? Who will study to increase what none can estimate? Who will +accumulate, when he does not know the value of what he saves? If you +abstract it from its uses in gaming, to accumulate your paper wealth +would be, not the providence of a man, but the distempered instinct of a +jackdaw.</p> + +<p>The truly melancholy part of the policy of systematically making a +nation of gamesters is this,—that, though all are forced to play, few +can understand the game, and fewer still are in a condition to avail +themselves of that knowledge. The many must be the dupes of the few who +conduct the machine of these speculations. What effect it must have on +the country-people is visible. The townsman can calculate from day to +day; not so the inhabitant of the country. When the peasant first brings +his corn to <a name="Page_490" id="Page_490" title="490" class="pagenum"></a>market, the magistrate in the towns obliges him to take the +assignat at par; when he goes to the shop with this money, he finds it +seven per cent the worse for crossing the way. This market he will not +readily resort to again. The towns-people will be inflamed; they will +force the country-people to bring their corn. Resistance will begin, and +the murders of Paris and St. Denis may be renewed through all France.</p> + +<p>What signifies the empty compliment paid to the country, by giving it, +perhaps, more than its share in the theory of your representation? Where +have you placed the real power over moneyed and landed circulation? +Where have you placed the means of raising and falling the value of +every man's freehold? Those whose operations can take from or add ten +per cent to the possessions of every man in France must be the masters +of every man in France. The whole of the power obtained by this +Revolution will settle in the towns among the burghers, and the moneyed +directors who lead them. The landed gentleman, the yeoman, and the +peasant have, none of them, habits or inclinations or experience which +can lead them to any share in this the sole source of power and +influence now left in France. The very nature of a country life, the +very nature of landed property, in all the occupations and all the +pleasures they afford, render combination and arrangement (the sole way +of procuring and exerting influence) in a manner impossible amongst +country-people. Combine them by all the art you can, and all the +industry, they are always dissolving into individuality. Anything in the +nature of incorporation is almost impracticable amongst them. Hope, +fear, alarm, <a name="Page_491" id="Page_491" title="491" class="pagenum"></a>jealousy, the ephemerous tale that does its business and +dies in a day, all these things, which are the reins and spurs by which +leaders check or urge the minds of followers, are not easily employed, +or hardly at all, amongst scattered people. They assemble, they arm, +they act, with the utmost difficulty, and at the greatest charge. Their +efforts, if ever they can be commenced, cannot be sustained. They cannot +proceed systematically. If the country-gentlemen attempt an influence +through the mere income of their property, what is it to that of those +who have ten times their income to sell, and who can ruin their property +by bringing their plunder to meet it at market? If the landed man wishes +to mortgage, he falls the value of his land and raises the value of +assignats. He augments the power of his enemy by the very means he must +take to contend with him. The country-gentleman, therefore, the officer +by sea and land, the man of liberal views and habits, attached to no +profession, will be as completely excluded from the government of his +country as if he were legislatively proscribed. It is obvious, that, in +the towns, all the things which conspire against the country-gentleman +combine in favor of the money manager and director. In towns combination +is natural. The habits of burghers, their occupations, their diversion, +their business, their idleness, continually bring them into mutual +contact. Their virtues and their vices are sociable; they are always in +garrison; and they come embodied and half-disciplined into the hands of +those who mean to form them for civil or military action.</p> + +<p>All these considerations leave no doubt on my mind, that, if this +monster of a Constitution can continue, France will be wholly governed +by the agita<a name="Page_492" id="Page_492" title="492" class="pagenum"></a>tors in corporations, by societies in the towns, formed of +directors in assignats, and trustees for the sale of Church lands, +attorneys, agents, money-jobbers, speculators, and adventurers, +composing an ignoble oligarchy, founded on the destruction of the crown, +the Church, the nobility, and the people. Here end all the deceitful +dreams and visions of the equality and rights of men. In "the Serbonian +bog" of this base oligarchy they are all absorbed, sunk, and lost +forever.</p> + +<p>Though human eyes cannot trace them, one would be tempted to think some +great offences in France must cry to Heaven, which has thought fit to +punish it with a subjection to a vile and inglorious domination, in +which no comfort or compensation is to be found in any even of those +false splendors which, playing about other tyrannies, prevent mankind +from feeling themselves dishonored even whilst they are oppressed. I +must confess I am touched with a sorrow mixed with some indignation, at +the conduct of a few men, once of great rank, and still of great +character, who, deluded with specious names, have engaged in a business +too deep for the line of their understanding to fathom,—who have lent +their fair reputation and the authority of their high-sounding names to +the designs of men with whom they could not be acquainted, and have +thereby made their very virtues operate to the ruin of their country.</p> + +<p>So far as to the first cementing principle.</p> + +<p>The second material of cement for their new republic is the superiority +of the city of Paris; and this, I admit, is strongly connected with the +other cementing principle of paper circulation and confiscation. It is +in this part of the project we must look for the <a name="Page_493" id="Page_493" title="493" class="pagenum"></a>cause of the +destruction of all the old bounds of provinces and jurisdictions, +ecclesiastical and secular, and the dissolution of all ancient +combinations of things, as well as the formation of so many small +unconnected republics. The power of the city of Paris is evidently one +great spring of all their politics. It is through the power of Paris, +now become the centre and focus of jobbing, that the leaders of this +faction direct, or rather command, the whole legislative and the whole +executive government. Everything, therefore, must be done which can +confirm the authority of that city over the other republics. Paris is +compact; she has an enormous strength, wholly disproportioned to the +force of any of the square republics; and this strength is collected and +condensed within a narrow compass. Paris has a natural and easy +connection of its parts, which will not be affected by any scheme of a +geometrical constitution; nor does it much signify whether its +proportion of representation be more or less, since it has the whole +draught of fishes in its drag-net. The other divisions of the kingdom, +being hackled and torn to pieces, and separated from all their habitual +means and even principles of union, cannot, for some time at least, +confederate against her. Nothing was to be left in all the subordinate +members, but weakness, disconnection, and confusion. To confirm this +part of the plan, the Assembly has lately come to a resolution that no +two of their republics shall have the same commander-in-chief.</p> + +<p>To a person who takes a view of the whole, the strength of Paris, thus +formed, will appear a system of general weakness. It is boasted that the +geometrical policy has been adopted, that all local ideas <a name="Page_494" id="Page_494" title="494" class="pagenum"></a>should be +sunk, and that the people should be no longer Gascons, Picards, Bretons, +Normans,—but Frenchmen, with one country, one heart, and one Assembly. +But, instead of being all Frenchmen, the greater likelihood is that the +inhabitants of that region will shortly have no country. No man ever was +attached by a sense of pride, partiality, or real affection, to a +description of square measurement. He never will glory in belonging to +the chequer No. 71, or to any other badge-ticket. We begin our public +affections in our families. No cold relation is a zealous citizen. We +pass on to our neighborhoods, and our habitual provincial connections. +These are inns and resting-places. Such divisions of our country as have +been formed by habit, and not by a sudden jerk of authority, were so +many little images of the great country, in which the heart found +something which it could fill. The love to the whole is not extinguished +by this subordinate partiality. Perhaps it is a sort of elemental +training to those higher and more large regards by which alone men come +to be affected, as with their own concern, in the prosperity of a +kingdom so extensive as that of France. In that general territory +itself, as in the old name of Provinces, the citizens are interested +from old prejudices and unreasoned habits, and not on account of the +geometric properties of its figure. The power and preëminence of Paris +does certainly press down and hold these republics together as long as +it lasts: but, for the reasons I have already given you, I think it can +not last very long.</p> + +<p>Passing from the civil creating and the civil cementing principles of +this Constitution to the National Assembly, which is to appear and act +as sovereign, <a name="Page_495" id="Page_495" title="495" class="pagenum"></a>we see a body in its constitution with every possible +power and no possible external control. We see a body without +fundamental laws, without established maxims, without respected rules of +proceeding, which nothing can keep firm to any system whatsoever. Their +idea of their powers is always taken at the utmost stretch of +legislative competency, and their examples for common cases from the +exceptions of the most urgent necessity. The future is to be in most +respects like the present Assembly; but, by the mode of the new +elections and the tendency of the new circulations, it will be purged of +the small degree of internal control existing in a minority chosen +originally from various interests, and preserving something of their +spirit. If possible, the next Assembly must be worse than the present. +The present, by destroying and altering everything, will leave to their +successors apparently nothing popular to do. They will be roused by +emulation and example to enterprises the boldest and the most absurd. To +suppose such an Assembly sitting in perfect quietude is ridiculous.</p> + +<p>Your all-sufficient legislators, in their hurry to do everything at +once, have forgot one thing that seems essential, and which, I believe, +never has been before, in the theory or the practice, omitted by any +projector of a republic. They have forgot to constitute a <i>senate</i>, or +something of that nature and character. Never, before this time, was +heard of a body politic composed of one legislative and active assembly, +and its executive officers, without such a council: without something to +which foreign states might connect themselves,—something to which, in +the ordinary detail of government, the people could look up,—something +which might give a bias and steadiness, <a name="Page_496" id="Page_496" title="496" class="pagenum"></a>and preserve something like +consistency in the proceedings of state. Such a body kings generally +have as a council. A monarchy may exist without it; but it seems to be +in the very essence of a republican government. It holds a sort of +middle place between the supreme power exercised by the people, or +immediately delegated from them, and the mere executive. Of this there +are no traces in your Constitution; and in providing nothing of this +kind, your Solons and Numas have, as much as in anything else, +discovered a sovereign incapacity.</p> + +<p>Let us now turn our eyes to what they have done towards the formation of +an executive power. For this they have chosen a degraded king. This +their first executive officer is to be a machine, without any sort of +deliberative discretion in any one act of his function. At best, he is +but a channel to convey to the National Assembly such matter as may +import that body to know. If he had been made the exclusive channel, the +power would not have been without its importance, though infinitely +perilous to those who would choose to exercise it. But public +intelligence and statement of facts may pass to the Assembly with equal +authenticity through any other conveyance. As to the means, therefore, +of giving a direction to measures by the statement of an authorized +reporter, this office of intelligence is as nothing.</p> + +<p>To consider the French scheme of an executive officer, in its two +natural divisions of civil and political.—In the first it must be +observed, that, according to the new Constitution, the higher parts of +judicature, in either of its lines, are not in the king. The king of +France is not the fountain of justice. The judges, neither the original +nor the appellate, are of <a name="Page_497" id="Page_497" title="497" class="pagenum"></a>his nomination. He neither proposes the +candidates nor has a negative on the choice. He is not even the public +prosecutor. He serves only as a notary, to authenticate the choice made +of the judges in the several districts. By his officers he is to execute +their sentence. When we look into the true nature of his authority, he +appears to be nothing more than a chief of bumbailiffs, +sergeants-at-mace, catchpoles, jailers, and hangmen. It is impossible to +place anything called royalty in a more degrading point of view. A +thousand times better it had been for the dignity of this unhappy +prince, that he had nothing at all to do with the administration of +justice, deprived as he is of all that is venerable and all that is +consolatory in that function, without power of originating any process, +without a power of suspension, mitigation, or pardon. Everything in +justice that is vile and odious is thrown upon him. It was not for +nothing that the Assembly has been at such pains to remove the stigma +from certain offices, when they were resolved to place the person who +had lately been their king in a situation but one degree above the +executioner, and in an office nearly of the same quality. It is not in +Nature, that, situated as the king of the French now is, he can respect +himself or can be respected by others.</p> + +<p>View this new executive officer on the side of his political capacity, +as he acts under the orders of the National Assembly. To execute laws is +a royal office; to execute orders is not to be a king. However, a +political executive magistracy, though merely such, is a great trust. It +is a trust, indeed, that has much depending upon its faithful and +diligent performance, both in the person presiding in it and in <a name="Page_498" id="Page_498" title="498" class="pagenum"></a>all its +subordinates. Means of performing this duty ought to be given by +regulation; and dispositions towards it ought to be infused by the +circumstances attendant on the trust. It ought to be environed with +dignity, authority, and consideration, and it ought to lead to glory. +The office of execution is an office of exertion. It is not from +impotence we are to expect the tasks of power. What sort of person is a +king to command executory service, who has no means whatsoever to reward +it:—not in a permanent office; not in a grant of land; no, not in a +pension of fifty pounds a year; not in the vainest and most trivial +title? In France the king is no more the fountain of honor than he is +the fountain of justice. All rewards, all distinctions, are in other +hands. Those who serve the king can be actuated by no natural motive but +fear,—by a fear of everything except their master. His functions of +internal coercion are as odious as those which he exercises in the +department of justice. If relief is to be given to any municipality, the +Assembly gives it. If troops are to be sent to reduce them to obedience +to the Assembly, the king is to execute the order; and upon every +occasion he is to be spattered over with the blood of his people. He has +no negative; yet his name and authority is used to enforce every harsh +decree. Nay, he must concur in the butchery of those who shall attempt +to free him from his imprisonment, or show the slightest attachment to +his person or to his ancient authority.</p> + +<p>Executive magistracy ought to be constituted in such a manner that those +who compose it should be disposed to love and to venerate those whom +they are bound to obey. A purposed neglect, or, what is <a name="Page_499" id="Page_499" title="499" class="pagenum"></a>worse, a +literal, but perverse and malignant obedience, must be the ruin of the +wisest counsels. In vain will the law attempt to anticipate or to follow +such studied neglects and fraudulent attentions. To make them act +zealously is not in the competence of law. Kings, even such as are truly +kings, may and ought to bear the freedom of subjects that are obnoxious +to them. They may, too, without derogating from themselves, bear even +the authority of such persons, if it promotes their service. Louis the +Thirteenth mortally hated the Cardinal de Richelieu; but his support of +that minister against his rivals was the source of all the glory of his +reign, and the solid foundation of his throne itself. Louis the +Fourteenth, when come to the throne, did not love the Cardinal Mazarin; +but for his interests he preserved him in power. When old, he detested +Louvois; but for years, whilst he faithfully served his greatness, he +endured his person. When George the Second took Mr. Pitt, who certainly +was not agreeable to him, into his councils, he did nothing which could +humble a wise sovereign. But these ministers, who were chosen by +affairs, not by affections, acted in the name of and in trust for kings, +and not as their avowed constitutional and ostensible masters. I think +it impossible that any king, when he has recovered his first terrors, +can cordially infuse vivacity and vigor into measures which he knows to +be dictated by those who, he must be persuaded, are in the highest +degree ill affected to his person. Will any ministers, who serve such a +king (or whatever he may be called) with but a decent appearance of +respect, cordially obey the orders of those whom but the other day in +his name they had committed to the Bastile? will <a name="Page_500" id="Page_500" title="500" class="pagenum"></a>they obey the orders +of those whom, whilst they were exercising despotic justice upon them, +they conceived they were treating with lenity, and for whom in a prison +they thought they had provided an asylum? If you expect such obedience, +amongst your other innovations and regenerations, you ought to make a +revolution in Nature, and provide a new constitution, for the human +mind: otherwise your supreme government cannot harmonize with its +executory system. There are cases in which we cannot take up with names +and abstractions. You may call half a dozen leading individuals, whom we +have reason to fear and hate, the nation. It makes no other difference +than to make us fear and hate them the more. If it had been thought +justifiable and expedient to make such a revolution by such means and +through such persons as you have made yours, it would have been more +wise to have completed the business of the fifth and sixth of October. +The new executive officer would then owe his situation to those who are +his creators as well as his masters; and he might be bound in interest, +in the society of crime, and (if in crimes there could be virtues) in +gratitude, to serve those who had promoted him to a place of great lucre +and great sensual indulgence,—and of something more: for more he must +have received from those who certainly would not have limited an +aggrandized creature as they have done a submitting antagonist.</p> + +<p>A king circumstanced as the present, if he is totally stupefied by his +misfortunes, so as to think it not the necessity, but the premium and +privilege of life, to eat and sleep, without any regard to glory, can +never be fit for the office. If he feels as men commonly feel, he must +he sensible that an office so cir<a name="Page_501" id="Page_501" title="501" class="pagenum"></a>cumstanced is one in which he can +obtain no fame or reputation. He has no generous interest that can +excite him to action. At best, his conduct will be passive and +defensive. To inferior people such an office might be matter of honor. +But to be raised to it and to descend to it are different things, and +suggest different sentiments. Does he <i>really</i> name the ministers? They +will have a sympathy with him. Are they forced upon him? The whole +business between them and the nominal king will be mutual counteraction. +In all other countries the office of ministers of state is of the +highest dignity. In France it is full of peril, and incapable of glory. +Rivals, however, they will have in their nothingness, whilst shallow +ambition exists in the world, or the desire of a miserable salary is an +incentive to short-sighted avarice. Those competitors of the ministers +are enabled by your Constitution to attack them in their vital parts, +whilst they have not the means of repelling their charges in any other +than the degrading character of culprits. The ministers of state in +Prance are the only persons in that country who are incapable of a share +in the national councils. What ministers! What councils! What a +nation!—But they are responsible. It is a poor service that is to be +had from responsibility. The elevation of mind to be derived from fear +will never make a nation glorious. Responsibility prevents crimes. It +makes all attempts against the laws dangerous. But for a principle of +active and zealous service, none but idiots could think of it. Is the +conduct of a war to be trusted to a man who may abhor its +principle,—who, in every step he may take to render it successful, +confirms the power of those by whom he is oppressed?<a name="Page_502" id="Page_502" title="502" class="pagenum"></a> Will foreign +states seriously treat with him who has no prerogative of peace or +war,—no, not so much as in a single vote by himself or his ministers, +or by any one whom he can possibly influence? A state of contempt is not +a state for a prince: better get rid of him at once.</p> + +<p>I know it will be said that these humors in the court and executive +government will continue only through this generation, and that the king +has been brought to declare the dauphin shall be educated in a +conformity to his situation. If he is made to conform to his situation, +he will have no education at all. His training must be worse even than +that of an arbitrary monarch. If he reads,—whether he reads or not, +some good or evil genius will tell him his ancestors were kings. +Thenceforward his object must be to assert himself and to avenge his +parents. This you will say is not his duty. That may be; but it is +Nature; and whilst you pique Nature against you, you do unwisely to +trust to duty. In this futile scheme of polity, the state nurses in its +bosom, for the present, a source of weakness, perplexity, counteraction, +inefficiency, and decay; and it prepares the means of its final ruin. In +short, I see nothing in the executive force (I cannot call it authority) +that has even an appearance of vigor, or that has the smallest degree of +just correspondence or symmetry or amicable relation with the supreme +power, either as it now exists, or as it is planned for the future +government.</p> + +<p>You have settled, by an economy as perverted as the policy, two<a name="FNanchor_125_126" id="FNanchor_125_126"></a><a href="#Footnote_125_126" class="fnanchor" title=" In reality three, to reckon the provincial republican +establishments.">[125]</a> +establishments of government,—one <a name="Page_503" id="Page_503" title="503" class="pagenum"></a>real, one fictitious: both +maintained at a vast expense; but the fictitious at, I think, the +greatest. Such a machine as the latter is not worth the grease of its +wheels. The expense is exorbitant; and neither the show nor the use +deserve the tenth part of the charge.—Oh! but I don't do justice to the +talents of the legislators: I don't allow, as I ought to do, for +necessity. Their scheme of executive force was not their choice. This +pageant must be kept. The people would not consent to part with +it.—Right: I understand you. You do, in spite of your grand theories, +to which you would have heaven and earth to bend, you do know how to +conform yourselves to the nature and circumstances of things. But when +you were obliged to conform thus far to circumstances, you ought to have +carried your submission farther, and to have made, what you were obliged +to take, a proper instrument, and useful to its end. That was in your +power. For instance, among many others, it was in your power to leave to +your king the right of peace and war.—What! to leave to the executive +magistrate the most dangerous of all prerogatives?—I know none more +dangerous; nor any one more necessary to be so trusted. I do not say +that this prerogative ought to be trusted to your king, unless he +enjoyed other auxiliary trusts along with it, which he does not now +hold. But, if he did possess them, hazardous as they are undoubtedly, +advantages would arise from such a Constitution, more than compensating +the risk. There is no other way of keeping the several potentates of +Europe from intriguing distinctly and personally with the members of +your Assembly, from intermeddling in all your concerns, and fomenting, +in the heart of your country, the most per<a name="Page_504" id="Page_504" title="504" class="pagenum"></a>nicious of all +factions,—factions in the interest and under the direction of foreign +powers. From that worst of evils, thank God, we are still free. Your +skill, if you had any, would be well employed to find out indirect +correctives and controls upon this perilous trust. If you did not like +those which in England we have chosen, your leaders might have exerted +their abilities in contriving better. If it were necessary to exemplify +the consequences of such an executive government as yours, in the +management of great affairs, I should refer you to the late reports of +M. de Montmorin to the National Assembly, and all the other proceedings +relative to the differences between Great Britain and Spain. It would be +treating your understanding with disrespect to point them out to you.</p> + +<p>I hear that the persons who are called ministers have signified an +intention of resigning their places. I am rather astonished that they +have not resigned long since. For the universe I would not have stood in +the situation in which they have been for this last twelvemonth. They +wished well, I take it for granted, to the Revolution. Let this fact be +as it may, they could not, placed as they were upon an eminence, though +an eminence of humiliation, but be the first to see collectively, and to +feel each in his own department, the evils which have been produced by +that Revolution. In every step which they took, or forbore to take, they +must have felt the degraded situation of their country, and their utter +incapacity of serving it. They are in a species of subordinate servitude +in which no men before them were ever seen. Without confidence from +their sovereign on whom they were forced, or from the Assembly who +<a name="Page_505" id="Page_505" title="505" class="pagenum"></a>forced them upon him, all the noble functions of their office are +executed by committees of the Assembly, without any regard whatsoever to +their personal or their official authority. They are to execute, without +power; they are to be responsible, without discretion; they are to +deliberate, without choice. In their puzzled situation, under two +sovereigns, over neither of whom they have any influence, they must act +in such a manner as (in effect, whatever they may intend) sometimes to +betray the one, sometimes the other, and always to betray themselves. +Such has been their situation; such must be the situation of those who +succeed them. I have much respect, and many good wishes, for M. Necker. +I am obliged to him for attentions. I thought, when his enemies had +driven him from Versailles, that his exile was a subject of most serious +congratulation. <i>Sed multæ urbes et publica vota vicerunt</i>. He is now +sitting on the ruins of the finances and of the monarchy of France.</p> + +<p>A great deal more might be observed on the strange constitution of the +executory part of the new government; but fatigue must give bounds to +the discussion of subjects which in themselves have hardly any limits.</p> + +<p>As little genius and talent am I able to perceive in the plan of +judicature formed by the National Assembly. According to their +invariable course, the framers of your Constitution have begun with the +utter abolition of the parliaments. These venerable bodies, like the +rest of the old government, stood in need of reform, even though there +should be no change made in the monarchy. They required several more +alterations to adapt them to the system of a free Con<a name="Page_506" id="Page_506" title="506" class="pagenum"></a>stitution. But +they had particulars in their constitution, and those not a few, which +deserved approbation from the wise. They possessed one fundamental +excellence: they were independent. The most doubtful circumstance +attendant on their office, that of its being vendible, contributed, +however, to this independency of character. They held for life. Indeed, +they may be said to have held by inheritance. Appointed by the monarch, +they were considered as nearly out of his power. The most determined +exertions of that authority against them only showed their radical +independence. They composed permanent bodies politic, constituted to +resist arbitrary innovation; and from that corporate constitution, and +from most of their forms, they were well calculated to afford both +certainty and stability to the laws. They had been a safe asylum to +secure these laws, in all the revolutions of humor and opinion. They had +saved that sacred deposit of the country during the reigns of arbitrary +princes and the struggles of arbitrary factions. They kept alive the +memory and record of the Constitution. They were the great security to +private property; which might be said (when personal liberty had no +existence) to be, in fact, as well guarded in France as in any other +country. Whatever is supreme in a state ought to have, as much as +possible, ifs judicial authority so constituted as not only not to +depend upon it, but in some sort to balance it. It ought to give a +security to its justice against its power. It ought to make its +judicature, as it were, something exterior to the state.</p> + +<p>Those parliaments had furnished, not the best certainly, but some +considerable corrective to the <a name="Page_507" id="Page_507" title="507" class="pagenum"></a>excesses and vices of the monarchy. Such +an independent judicature was ten times more necessary when a democracy +became the absolute power of the country. In that Constitution, +elective, temporary, local judges, such as you have contrived, +exercising their dependent functions in a narrow society, must be the +worst of all tribunals. In them it will be vain to look for any +appearance of justice towards strangers, towards the obnoxious rich, +towards the minority of routed parties, towards all those who in the +election have supported unsuccessful candidates. It will be impossible +to keep the new tribunals clear of the worst spirit of faction. All +contrivances by ballot we know experimentally to be vain and childish to +prevent a discovery of inclinations. Where they may the best answer the +purposes of concealment, they answer to produce suspicion, and this is a +still more mischievous cause of partiality.</p> + +<p>If the parliaments had been preserved, instead of being dissolved at so +ruinous a change to the nation, they might have served in this new +commonwealth, perhaps not precisely the same, (I do not mean an exact +parallel,) but near the same purposes as the court and senate of +Areopagus did in Athens: that is, as one of the balances and correctives +to the evils of a light and unjust democracy. Every one knows that this +tribunal was the great stay of that state; every one knows with what +care it was upheld, and with what a religious awe it was consecrated. +The parliaments were not wholly free from faction, I admit; but this +evil was exterior and accidental, and not so much the vice of their +constitution itself as it must be in your new contrivance of sexennial +elective judicatories. Several English commend the abolition of <a name="Page_508" id="Page_508" title="508" class="pagenum"></a>the old +tribunals, as supposing that they determined everything by bribery and +corruption. But they have stood the test of monarchic and republican +scrutiny. The court was well disposed to prove corruption on those +bodies, when they were dissolved in 1771; those who have again dissolved +them would have done the same, if they could; but both inquisitions +having failed, I conclude that gross pecuniary corruption must have been +rather rare amongst them.</p> + +<p>It would have been prudent, along with the parliaments, to preserve +their ancient power of registering, and of remonstrating at least upon, +all the decrees of the National Assembly, as they did upon those which +passed in the time of the monarchy. It would be a means of squaring the +occasional decrees of a democracy to some principles of general +jurisprudence. The vice of the ancient democracies, and one cause of +their ruin, was, that they ruled, as you do, by occasional decrees, +<i>psephismata</i>. This practice soon broke in upon the tenor and +consistency of the laws; it abated the respect of the people towards +them, and totally destroyed them in the end.</p> + +<p>Your vesting the power of remonstrance, which, in the time of the +monarchy, existed in the Parliament of Paris, in your principal +executive officer, whom, in spite of common sense, you persevere in +calling king, is the height of absurdity. You ought never to suffer +remonstrance from him who is to execute. This is to understand neither +council nor execution, neither authority nor obedience. The person whom +you call king ought not to have this power, or he ought to have more.</p> + +<p>Your present arrangement is strictly judicial. Instead of imitating your +monarchy, and seating your <a name="Page_509" id="Page_509" title="509" class="pagenum"></a>judges on a bench of independence, your +object is to reduce them to the most blind obedience. As you have +changed all things, you have invented new principles of order. You first +appoint judges, who, I suppose, are to determine according to law, and +then you let them know, that, at some time or other, you intend to give +them some law by which they are to determine. Any studies which they +have made (if any they have made) are to be useless to them. But to +supply these studies, they are to be sworn to obey all the rules, +orders, and instructions which from time to time they are to receive +from the National Assembly. These if they submit to, they leave no +ground of law to the subject. They become complete and most dangerous +instruments in the hands of the governing power, which, in the midst of +a cause, or on the prospect of it, may wholly change the rule of +decision. If these orders of the National Assembly come to be contrary +to the will of the people who locally choose those judges, such +confusion must happen as is terrible to think of. For the judges owe +their place to the local authority, and the commands they are sworn to +obey come from those who have no share in their appointment. In the mean +time they have the example of the court of <i>Châtelet</i> to encourage and +guide them in the exercise of their functions. That court is to try +criminals sent to it by the National Assembly, or brought before it by +other courses of delation. They sit under a guard to save their own +lives. They know not by what law they judge, nor under what authority +they act, nor by what tenure they hold. It is thought that they are +sometimes obliged to condemn at peril of their lives. This is not +perhaps certain, nor can it be as<a name="Page_510" id="Page_510" title="510" class="pagenum"></a>certained; but when they acquit, we +know they have seen the persons whom they discharge, with perfect +impunity to the actors, hanged at the door of their court.</p> + +<p>The Assembly, indeed, promises that they will form a body of law, which +shall be short, simple, clear, and so forth. That is, by their short +laws, they will leave much to the discretion of the judge, whilst they +have exploded the authority of all the learning which could make +judicial discretion (a thing perilous at best) deserving the appellation +of a <i>sound</i> discretion.</p> + +<p>It is curious to observe, that the administrative bodies are carefully +exempted from the jurisdiction of these new tribunals. That is, those +persons are exempted from the power of the laws who ought to be the most +entirely submitted to them. Those who execute public pecuniary trusts +ought of all men to be the most strictly held to their duty. One would +have thought that it must have been among your earliest cares, if you +did not mean that those administrative bodies should be real, sovereign, +independent states, to form an awful tribunal, like your late +parliaments, or like our King's Bench, where all corporate officers +might obtain protection in the legal exercise of their functions, and +would find coercion, if they trespassed against their legal duty. But +the cause of the exemption is plain. These administrative bodies are the +great instruments of the present leaders in their progress through +democracy to oligarchy. They must therefore be put above the law. It +will be said that the legal tribunals which you have made are unfit to +coerce them. They are, undoubtedly. They are unfit for any rational +purpose. It will be said, too, that the administrative bodies will <a name="Page_511" id="Page_511" title="511" class="pagenum"></a>be +accountable to the general Assembly. This, I fear, is talking without +much consideration of the nature of that Assembly or of these +corporations. However, to be subject to the pleasure of that Assembly is +not to be subject to law, either for protection or for constraint.</p> + +<p>This establishment of judges as yet wants something to its completion. +It is to be crowned by a new tribunal. This is to be a grand state +judicature; and it is to judge of crimes committed against the nation, +that is, against the power of the Assembly. It seems as if they had +something in their view of the nature of the high court of justice +erected in England during the time of the great usurpation. As they have +not yet finished this part of the scheme, it is impossible to form a +direct judgment upon it. However, if great care is not taken to form it +in a spirit very different from that which has guided them in their +proceedings relative to state offences, this tribunal, subservient to +their inquisition, <i>the Committee of Research</i>, will extinguish the last +sparks of liberty in France, and settle the most dreadful and arbitrary +tyranny ever known in any nation. If they wish to give to this tribunal +any appearance of liberty and justice, they must not evoke from or send +to it the causes relative to their own members, at their pleasure. They +must also remove the seat of that tribunal out of the republic of +Paris.<a name="FNanchor_126_127" id="FNanchor_126_127"></a><a href="#Footnote_126_127" class="fnanchor" title=" For further elucidations upon the subject of all these +judicatures and of the Committee of Research, see M. de Calonne's work.">[126]</a></p> + +<p>Has more wisdom been displayed in the constitution of your army than +what is discoverable in your plan of judicature? The able arrangement of +this part is the more difficult, and requires the greater <a name="Page_512" id="Page_512" title="512" class="pagenum"></a>skill and +attention, not only as a great concern in itself, but as it is the third +cementing principle in the new body of republics which you call the +French nation. Truly, it is not easy to divine what that army may become +at last. You have voted a very large one, and on good appointments, at +least fully equal to your apparent means of payment. But what is the +principle of its discipline? or whom is it to obey? You have got the +wolf by the ears, and I wish you joy of the happy position in which you +have chosen to place yourselves, and in which you are well circumstanced +for a free deliberation relatively to that army, or to anything else.</p> + +<p>The minister and secretary of state for the War Department is M. de La +Tour du Pin. This gentleman, like his colleagues in administration, is a +most zealous assertor of the Revolution, and a sanguine admirer of the +new Constitution which originated in that event. His statement of facts +relative to the military of France is important, not only from his +official and personal authority, but because it displays very clearly +the actual condition of the army in France, and because it throws light +on the principles upon which the Assembly proceeds in the administration +of this critical object. It may enable us to form some judgment how far +it may be expedient in this country to imitate the martial policy of +France.</p> + +<p>M. de La Tour du Pin, on the fourth of last June, comes to give an +account of the state of his department, as it exists under the auspices +of the National Assembly. No man knows it so well; no man can express it +better. Addressing himself to the National Assembly, he says,—</p> + +<p>"His Majesty has <i>this day</i> sent me to apprise you <a name="Page_513" id="Page_513" title="513" class="pagenum"></a>of the multiplied +disorders of which <i>every day</i> he receives the most distressing +intelligence. The army [<i>le corps militaire</i>] threatens to fall into the +most turbulent anarchy. Entire regiments have dared to violate at once +the respect due to the laws, to the king, to the order established by +your decrees, and to the oaths which they have taken with the most awful +solemnity. Compelled by my duty to give you information of these +excesses, my heart bleeds, when I consider who they are that have +committed them. Those against whom it is not in my power to withhold the +most grievous complaints are a part of that very soldiery which to this +day have been so full of honor and loyalty, and with whom for fifty +years I have lived the comrade and the friend.</p> + +<p>"What incomprehensible spirit of delirium and delusion has all at once +led them astray? Whilst you are indefatigable in establishing uniformity +in the empire and moulding the whole into one coherent and consistent +body, whilst the French are taught by you at once the respect which the +laws owe to the rights of man and that which the citizens owe to the +laws, the administration of the army presents nothing but disturbance +and confusion. I see in more than one corps the bonds of discipline +relaxed or broken,—the most unheard-of pretensions avowed directly and +without any disguise,—the ordinances without force,—the chiefs without +authority,—the military chest and the colors carried off,—the +authority of the king himself [<i>risum teneatis</i>] proudly defied,—the +officers despised, degraded, threatened, driven away, and some of them +prisoners in the midst of their corps, dragging on a precarious life in +the bosom of disgust and humiliation. To fill up the measure of all +these <a name="Page_514" id="Page_514" title="514" class="pagenum"></a>horrors, the commandants of places have had their throats out +under the eyes and almost in the arms of their own soldiers.</p> + +<p>"These evils are great; but they are not the worst consequences which +may be produced by such military insurrections. Sooner or later they may +menace the nation itself. <i>The nature of things requires</i> that the army +should never act but as <i>an instrument</i>. The moment that, erecting +itself into a deliberate body, it shall act according to its own +resolutions, <i>the government, be it what it may, will immediately +degenerate into a military democracy</i>: a species of political monster +which has always ended by devouring those who have produced it.</p> + +<p>"After all this, who must not be alarmed at the irregular consultations +and turbulent committees formed in some regiments by the common soldiers +and non-commissioned officers, without the knowledge, or even in +contempt of the authority, of their superiors?—although the presence +and concurrence of those superiors could give no authority to such +monstrous democratic assemblies [<i>comices</i>]."</p> + +<p>It is not necessary to add much to this finished picture,—finished as +far as its canvas admits, but, as I apprehend, not taking in the whole +of the nature and complexity of the disorders of this military +democracy, which, the minister at war truly and wisely observes, +wherever it exists, must be the true constitution of the state, by +whatever formal appellation it may pass. For, though he informs the +Assembly that the more considerable part of the army have not cast off +their obedience, but are still attached to their duty, yet those +travellers who have seen the corps whose conduct is the best rather +observe in <a name="Page_515" id="Page_515" title="515" class="pagenum"></a>them the absence of mutiny than the existence of discipline.</p> + +<p>I cannot help pausing here for a moment, to reflect upon the expressions +of surprise which this minister has let fall relative to the excesses he +relates. To him the departure of the troops from their ancient +principles of loyalty and honor seems quite inconceivable. Surely those +to whom he addresses himself know the causes of it but too well. They +know the doctrines which they have preached, the decrees which they have +passed, the practices which they have countenanced. The soldiers +remember the sixth of October. They recollect the French guards. They +have not forgot the taking of the king's castles in Paris and at +Marseilles. That the governors in both places were murdered with +impunity is a fact that has not passed out of their minds. They do not +abandon the principles, laid down so ostentatiously and laboriously, of +the equality of men. They cannot shut their eyes to the degradation of +the whole noblesse of France, and the suppression of the very idea of a +gentleman. The total abolition of titles and distinctions is not lost +upon them. But M. du Pin is astonished at their disloyalty, when the +doctors of the Assembly have taught them at the same time the respect +due to laws. It is easy to judge which of the two sorts of lessons men +with arms in their hands are likely to learn. As to the authority of the +king, we may collect from the minister himself (if any argument on that +head were not quite superfluous) that it is not of more consideration +with these troops than it is with everybody else. "The king," says he, +"has over and over again repeated his orders to put a stop to these +excesses; but in so <a name="Page_516" id="Page_516" title="516" class="pagenum"></a>terrible a crisis, <i>your</i> [the Assembly's] +concurrence is become indispensably necessary to prevent the evils which +menace the state. <i>You</i> unite to the force of the legislative power +<i>that of opinion</i>, still more important." To be sure, the army can have +no opinion of the power or authority of the king. Perhaps the soldier +has by this time learned, that the Assembly itself does not enjoy a much +greater degree of liberty than that royal figure.</p> + +<p>It is now to be seen what has been proposed in this exigency, one of the +greatest that can happen in a state. The minister requests the Assembly +to array itself in all its terrors, and to call forth all its majesty. +He desires that the grave and severe principles announced by them may +give vigor to the king's proclamation. After this we should have looked +for courts civil and martial, breaking of some corps, decimating of +others, and all the terrible means which necessity has employed in such +cases to arrest the progress of the most terrible of all evils; +particularly, one might expect that a serious inquiry would be made into +the murder of commandants in the view of their soldiers. Not one word of +all this, or of anything like it. After they had been told that the +soldiery trampled upon the decrees of the Assembly promulgated by the +king, the Assembly pass new decrees, and they authorize the king to make +new proclamations. After the secretary at war had stated that the +regiments had paid no regard to oaths, <i>prêtés avec la plus imposante +solennité</i>, they propose—what? More oaths. They renew decrees and +proclamations as they experience their insufficiency, and they multiply +oaths in proportion as they weaken in the minds of men the sanctions of +religion. I hope <a name="Page_517" id="Page_517" title="517" class="pagenum"></a>that handy abridgments of the excellent sermons of +Voltaire, D'Alembert, Diderot, and Helvétius, on the Immortality of the +Soul, on a Particular Superintending Providence, and on a Future State +of Rewards and Punishments, are sent down to the soldiers along with +their civic oaths. Of this I have no doubt; as I understand that a +certain description of reading makes no inconsiderable part of their +military exercises, and that they are full as well supplied with the +ammunition of pamphlets as of cartridges.</p> + +<p>To prevent the mischiefs arising from conspiracies, irregular +consultations, seditious committees, and monstrous democratic assemblies +[<i>comitia, comices</i>] of the soldiers, and all the disorders arising from +idleness, luxury, dissipation, and insubordination, I believe the most +astonishing means have been used that ever occurred to men, even in all +the inventions of this prolific age. It is no less than this:—The king +has promulgated in circular letters to all the regiments his direct +authority and encouragement, that the several corps should join +themselves with the clubs and confederations in the several +municipalities, and mix with them in their feasts and civic +entertainments! This jolly discipline, it seems, is to soften the +ferocity of their minds, to reconcile them to their bottle companions of +other descriptions, and to merge particular conspiracies in more general +associations.<a name="FNanchor_127_128" id="FNanchor_127_128"></a><a href="#Footnote_127_128" class="fnanchor" title=" "Comme sa Majesté a reconnu, non un système +d'associations particulières, mais une réunion de volontés de tous les +François pour la liberté et la prospérité communes, ainsi pour le +maintien de l'ordre publique, il a pensé qu'il convenoit que chaque +régiment prît part à ces fêtes civiques pour multiplier les rapports, et +resserrer les liens d'union entre les citoyens et les troupes."—Lest I +should not be credited, I insert the words authorizing the troops to +feast with the popular confederacies.">[127]</a> That this remedy would be pleasing to the soldiers, +as they are described by M. de La Tour du Pin, I can readily +believe,—and that, <a name="Page_518" id="Page_518" title="518" class="pagenum"></a>however mutinous otherwise, they will dutifully +submit themselves to <i>these</i> royal proclamations. But I should question +whether all this civic swearing, clubbing, and feasting would dispose +them, more than at present they are disposed, to an obedience to their +officers, or teach them better to submit to the austere rules of +military discipline. It will make them admirable citizens after the +French mode, but not quite so good soldiers after any mode. A doubt +might well arise, whether the conversations at these good tables would +fit them a great deal the better for the character of <i>mere +instruments</i>, which this veteran officer and statesman justly observes +the nature of things always requires an army to be.</p> + +<p>Concerning the likelihood of this improvement in discipline by the free +conversation of the soldiers with the municipal festive societies, which +is thus officially encouraged by royal authority and sanction, we may +judge by the state of the municipalities themselves, furnished to us by +the war minister in this very speech. He conceives good hopes of the +success of his endeavors towards restoring order <i>for the present</i> from +the good disposition of certain regiments; but he finds something cloudy +with regard to the future. As to preventing the return of confusion, +"for this the administration" (says he) "cannot be answerable to you, as +long as they see the municipalities arrogate to themselves an authority +over the troops which your institutions have reserved wholly to the +monarch. You have fixed the limits of the military authority <a name="Page_519" id="Page_519" title="519" class="pagenum"></a>and the +municipal authority. You have bounded the action which you have +permitted to the latter over the former to the right of requisition; but +never did the letter or the spirit of your decrees authorize the commons +in these municipalities to break the officers, to try them, to give +orders to the soldiers, to drive them from the posts committed to their +guard, to stop them in their marches ordered by the king, or, in a word, +to enslave the troops to the caprice of each of the cities or even +market-towns through which they are to pass."</p> + +<p>Such is the character and disposition of the municipal society which is +to reclaim the soldiery, to bring them back to the true principles of +military subordination, and to lender them machines in the hands of the +supreme power of the country! Such are the distempers of the French +troops! Such is their cure! As the army is, so is the navy. The +municipalities supersede the orders of the Assembly, and the seamen in +their turn supersede the orders of the municipalities. From my heart I +pity the condition of a respectable servant of the public, like this war +minister, obliged in his old age to pledge the Assembly in their civic +cups, and to enter with a hoary head into all the fantastic vagaries of +these juvenile politicians. Such schemes are not like propositions +coming from a man of fifty years' wear and tear amongst mankind. They +seem rather such as ought to be expected from those grand compounders in +politics who shorten the road to their degrees in the state, and have a +certain inward fanatical assurance and illumination upon all +subjects,—upon the credit of which, one of their doctors has thought +fit, with great applause, and greater success, to caution the Assembly +not to attend to old <a name="Page_520" id="Page_520" title="520" class="pagenum"></a>men, or to any persons who value themselves upon +their experience. I suppose all the ministers of state must qualify, and +take this test,—wholly abjuring the errors and heresies of experience +and observation. Every man has his own relish; but I think, if I could +not attain to the wisdom, I would at least preserve something of the +stiff and peremptory dignity of age. These gentlemen deal in +regeneration: but at any price I should hardly yield my rigid fibres to +be regenerated by them,—nor begin, in my grand climacteric, to squall +in their new accents, or to stammer, in my second cradle, the elemental +sounds of their barbarous metaphysics.<a name="FNanchor_128_129" id="FNanchor_128_129"></a><a href="#Footnote_128_129" class="fnanchor" title=" This war minister has since quitted the school and +resigned his office.">[128]</a> <i>Si isti mihi largiantur ut +repuerascam, et in eorum cunis vagiam, valde recusem!</i></p> + +<p>The imbecility of any part of the puerile and pedantic system which they +call a Constitution cannot be laid open without discovering the utter +insufficiency and mischief of every other part with which it comes in +contact, or that bears any the remotest relation to it. You cannot +propose a remedy for the incompetence of the crown, without displaying +the debility of the Assembly. You cannot deliberate on the confusion of +the army of the state, without disclosing the worse disorders of the +armed municipalities. The military lays open the civil, and the civil +betrays the military anarchy. I wish everybody carefully to peruse the +eloquent speech (such it is) of Mons. de La Tour du Pin. He attributes +the salvation of the municipalities to the good behavior of some of the +troops. These troops are to preserve the well-disposed part of the +municipalities, which is <a name="Page_521" id="Page_521" title="521" class="pagenum"></a>confessed to be the weakest, from the pillage +of the worst disposed, which is the strongest. But the municipalities +affect a sovereignty, and will command those troops which are necessary +for their protection. Indeed, they must command them or court them. The +municipalities, by the necessity of their situation, and by the +republican powers they have obtained, must, with relation to the +military, be the masters, or the servants, or the confederates, or each +successively, or they must make a jumble of all together, according to +circumstances. What government is there to coerce the army but the +municipality, or the municipality but the army? To preserve concord +where authority is extinguished, at the hazard of all consequences, the +Assembly attempts to cure the distempers by the distempers themselves; +and they hope to preserve themselves from a purely military democracy by +giving it a debauched interest in the municipal.</p> + +<p>If the soldiers once come to mix for any time in the municipal clubs, +cabals, and confederacies, an elective attraction will draw them to the +lowest and most desperate part. With them will be their habits, +affections, and sympathies. The military conspiracies which are to be +remedied by civic confederacies, the rebellious municipalities which are +to be rendered obedient by furnishing them with the means of seducing +the very armies of the state that are to keep them in order,—all these +chimeras of a monstrous and portentous policy must aggravate the +confusion from which they have arisen. There must be blood. The want of +common judgment manifested in the construction of all their descriptions +of forces, and in all their kinds of civil and judicial authorities, +will <a name="Page_522" id="Page_522" title="522" class="pagenum"></a>make it flow. Disorders may be quieted in one time and in one +part. They will break out in others; because the evil is radical and +intrinsic. All these schemes of mixing mutinous soldiers with seditious +citizens must weaken still more and more the military connection of +soldiers with their officers, as well as add military and mutinous +audacity to turbulent artificers and peasants. To secure a real army, +the officer should be first and last in the eye of the soldier,—first +and last in his attention, observance, and esteem. Officers, it seems, +there are to be, whose chief qualification must be temper and patience. +They are to manage their troops by electioneering arts. They must bear +themselves as candidates, not as commanders. But as by such means power +may be occasionally in their hands, the authority by which they are to +be nominated becomes of high importance.</p> + +<p>What you may do finally does not appear: nor is it of much moment, +whilst the strange and contradictory relation between your army and all +the parts of your republic, as well as the puzzled relation of those +parts to each other and to the whole, remain as they are. You seem to +have given the provisional nomination of the officers, in the first +instance, to the king, with a reserve of approbation by the National +Assembly. Men who have an interest to pursue are extremely sagacious in +discovering the true seat of power. They must soon perceive that those +who can negative indefinitely in reality appoint. The officers must +therefore look to their intrigues in the Assembly as the sole certain +road to promotion. Still, however, by your new Constitution, they must +begin their solicitation at court. This double negotiation for military +rank seems to me a contrivance, <a name="Page_523" id="Page_523" title="523" class="pagenum"></a>as well adapted as if it were studied +for no other end, to promote faction in the Assembly itself relative to +this vast military patronage,—and then to poison the corps of officers +with factions of a nature still more dangerous to the safety of +government, upon any bottom on which it can be placed, and destructive +in the end to the efficacy of the army itself. Those officers who lose +the promotions intended for them by the crown must become of a faction +opposite to that of the Assembly which has rejected their claims, and +must nourish discontents in the heart of the army against the ruling +powers. Those officers, on the other hand, who, by carrying their point +through an interest in the Assembly, feel themselves to be at best only +second in the good-will of the crown, though first in that of the +Assembly, must slight an authority which would not advance and could not +retard their promotion. If, to avoid these evils, you will have no other +rule for command or promotion than seniority, you will have an army of +formality; at the same time it will become more independent and more of +a military republic. Not they, but the king is the machine. A king is +not to be deposed by halves. If he is not everything in the command of +an army, he is nothing. What is the effect of a power placed nominally +at the head of the army, who to that army is no object of gratitude or +of fear? Such a cipher is not fit for the administration of an object of +all things the most delicate, the supreme command of military men. They +must be constrained (and their inclinations lead them to what their +necessities require) by a real, vigorous, effective, decided, personal +authority. The authority of the Assembly itself suffers by passing +through such a <a name="Page_524" id="Page_524" title="524" class="pagenum"></a>debilitating channel as they have chosen. The army will +not long look to an Assembly acting through the organ of false show and +palpable imposition. They will not seriously yield obedience to a +prisoner. They will either despise a pageant, or they will pity a +captive king. This relation of your army to the crown will, if I am not +greatly mistaken, become a serious dilemma in your politics.</p> + +<p>It is besides to be considered, whether an Assembly like yours, even +supposing that it was in possession of another sort of organ, through +which its orders were to pass, is fit for promoting the obedience and +discipline of an army. It is known that armies have hitherto yielded a +very precarious and uncertain obedience to any senate or popular +authority; and they will least of all yield it to an Assembly which is +to have only a continuance of two years. The officers must totally lose +the characteristic disposition of military men, if they see with perfect +submission and due admiration the dominion of pleaders,—especially when +they find that they have a new court to pay to an endless succession of +those pleaders, whose military policy, and the genius of whose command, +(if they should have any,) must be as uncertain as their duration is +transient. In the weakness of one kind of authority, and in the +fluctuation of all, the officers of an army will remain for some time +mutinous and full of faction, until some popular general, who +understands the art of conciliating the soldiery, and who possesses the +true spirit of command, shall draw the eyes of all men upon himself. +Armies will obey him on his personal account. There is no other way of +securing military obedience in this state of things. But the moment in +which that event shall happen, <a name="Page_525" id="Page_525" title="525" class="pagenum"></a>the person who really commands the army +is your master,—the master (that is little) of your king, the master of +your Assembly, the master of your whole republic.</p> + +<p>How came the Assembly by their present power over the army? Chiefly, to +be sure, by debauching the soldiers from their officers. They have begun +by a most terrible operation. They have touched the central point about +which the particles that compose armies are at repose. They have +destroyed the principle of obedience in the great, essential, critical +link between the officer and the soldier, just where the chain of +military subordination commences, and on which the whole of that system, +depends. The soldier is told he is a citizen, and has the rights of man +and citizen. The right of a man, he is told, is, to be his own governor, +and to be ruled only by those to whom he delegates that self-government. +It is very natural he should think that he ought most of all to have his +choice where he is to yield the greatest degree of obedience. He will +therefore, in all probability, systematically do what he does at present +occasionally: that is, he will exercise at least a negative in the +choice of his officers. At present the officers are known at best to be +only permissive, and on their good behavior. In fact, there have been +many instances in which they have been cashiered by their corps. Here is +a second negative on the choice of the king: a negative as effectual, at +least, as the other of the Assembly. The soldiers know already that it +has been a question, not ill received in the National Assembly, whether +they ought not to have the direct choice of their officers, or some +proportion of them. When such matters are in deliberation, it is no +ex<a name="Page_526" id="Page_526" title="526" class="pagenum"></a>travagant supposition that they will incline to the opinion most +favorable to their pretensions. They will not bear to be deemed the army +of an imprisoned king, whilst another army in the same country, with +whom too they are to feast and confederate, is to be considered as the +free army of a free Constitution. They will cast their eyes on the other +and more permanent army: I mean the municipal. That corps, they well +know, does actually elect its own officers. They may not be able to +discern the grounds of distinction on which they are not to elect a +Marquis de La Fayette (or what is his new name?) of their own. If this +election of a commander-in-chief be a part of the rights of men, why not +of theirs? They see elective justices of peace, elective judges, +elective curates, elective bishops, elective municipalities, and +elective commanders of the Parisian army. Why should they alone be +excluded? Are the brave troops of France the only men in that nation who +are not the fit judges of military merit, and of the qualifications +necessary for a commander-in-chief? Are they paid by the state, and do +they therefore lose the rights of men? They are a part of that nation +themselves, and contribute to that pay. And is not the king, is not the +National Assembly, and are not all who elect the National Assembly, +likewise paid? Instead of seeing all these forfeit their rights by their +receiving a salary, they perceive that in all these cases a salary is +given for the exercise of those rights. All your resolutions, all your +proceedings, all your debates, all the works of your doctors in religion +and politics, have industriously been put into their hands; and you +expect that they will apply to their own case just as much of your +doctrines and examples as suits your pleasure.<a name="Page_527" id="Page_527" title="527" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>Everything depends upon the army in such a government as yours; for you +have industriously destroyed all the opinions and prejudices, and, as +far as in you lay, all the instincts which support government. Therefore +the moment any difference arises between your National Assembly and any +part of the nation, you must have recourse to force. Nothing else is +left to you,—or rather, you have left nothing else to yourselves. You +see, by the report of your war minister, that the distribution of the +army is in a great measure made with a view of internal coercion.<a name="FNanchor_129_130" id="FNanchor_129_130"></a><a href="#Footnote_129_130" class="fnanchor" title=" Courrier François, 30 July, 1790. Assemblée Nationale, +Numero 210.">[129]</a> +You must rule by an army; and you have infused into that army by which +you rule, as well as into the whole body of the nation, principles which +after a time must disable you in the use you resolve to make of it. The +king is to call out troops to act against his people, when the world has +been told, and the assertion is still ringing in our ears, that troops +ought not to fire on citizens. The colonies assert to themselves an +independent constitution and a free trade. They must be constrained by +troops. In what chapter of your code of the rights of men are they able +to read that it is a part of the rights of men to have their commerce +monopolized and restrained for the benefit of others? As the colonists +rise on you, the negroes rise on them. Troops again,—massacre, torture, +hanging! These are your rights of men! These are the fruits of +metaphysic declarations wantonly made and shamefully retracted! It was +but the other day that the farmers of land in one of your provinces +refused to pay some sorts of rents to the lord of the soil. In +consequence of this, you decree that <a name="Page_528" id="Page_528" title="528" class="pagenum"></a>the country-people shall pay all +rents and dues, except those which as grievances you have abolished; and +if they refuse, then you order the king to march troops against them. +You lay down metaphysic propositions which infer universal consequences, +and then you attempt to limit logic by despotism. The leaders of the +present system tell them of their rights, as men, to take fortresses, to +murder guards, to seize on kings without the least appearance of +authority even from the Assembly, whilst, as the sovereign legislative +body, that Assembly was sitting in the name of the nation; and yet these +leaders presume to order out the troops which have acted in these very +disorders, to coerce those who shall judge on the principles and follow +the examples which have been guarantied by their own approbation.</p> + +<p>The leaders teach the people to abhor and reject all feodality as the +barbarism of tyranny; and they tell them afterwards how much of that +barbarous tyranny they are to bear with patience. As they are prodigal +of light with regard to grievances, so the people find them sparing in +the extreme with regard to redress. They know that not only certain +quit-rents and personal duties, which you have permitted them to redeem, +(but have furnished no money for the redemption,) are as nothing to +those burdens for which you have made no provision at all; they know +that almost the whole system of landed property in its origin is +feudal,—that it is the distribution of the possessions of the original +proprietors made by a barbarous conqueror to his barbarous +instruments,—and that the most grievous effects of the conquest axe the +land-rents of every kind, as without question they are.<a name="Page_529" id="Page_529" title="529" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>The peasants, in all probability, are the descendants of these ancient +proprietors, Romans or Gauls. But if they fail, in any degree, in the +titles which they make on the principles of antiquaries and lawyers, +they retreat into the citadel of the rights of men. There they find that +men are equal; and the earth, the kind and equal mother of all, ought +not to be monopolized to foster the pride and luxury of any men, who by +nature are no better than themselves, and who, if they do not labor for +their bread, are worse. They find, that, by the laws of Nature, the +occupant and subduer of the soil is the true proprietor,—that there is +no prescription against Nature,—and that the agreements (where any +there are) which have been made with the landlords during the time of +slavery are only the effect of duresse and force,—and that, when the +people reëntered into the rights of men, those agreements were made as +void as everything else which had been settled under the prevalence of +the old feudal and aristocratic tyranny. They will tell you that they +see no difference between an idler with a hat and a national cockade and +an idler in a cowl or in a rochet. If you ground the title to rents on +succession and prescription, they tell you from the speech of M. Camus, +published by the National Assembly for their information, that things +ill begun cannot avail themselves of prescription,—that the title of +those lords was vicious in its origin,—and that force is at least as +bad as fraud. As to the title by succession, they will tell you that the +succession of those who have cultivated the soil is the true pedigree of +property, and not rotten parchments and silly substitutions,—that the +lords have enjoyed their usurpation too long,—and that, if they allow +to these <a name="Page_530" id="Page_530" title="530" class="pagenum"></a>lay monks any charitable pension, they ought to be thankful to +the bounty of the true proprietor, who is so generous towards a false +claimant to his goods.</p> + +<p>When the peasants give you back that coin of sophistic reason on which +you have set your image and superscription, you cry it down as base +money, and tell them you will pay for the future with French guards and +dragoons and hussars. You hold up, to chastise them, the second-hand +authority of a king, who is only the instrument of destroying, without +any power of protecting either the people or his own person. Through +him, it seems, you will make yourselves obeyed. They answer,—"You have +taught us that there are no gentlemen; and which of your principles +teach us to bow to kings whom we have not elected? We know, without your +teaching, that lands were given for the support of feudal dignities, +feudal titles, and feudal offices. When you took down the cause as a +grievance, why should the more grievous effect remain? As there are now +no hereditary honors and no distinguished families, why are we taxed to +maintain what you tell us ought not to exist? You have sent down our old +aristocratic landlords in no other character and with no other title but +that of exactors under your authority. Have you endeavored to make these +your rent-gatherers respectable to us? No. You have sent them to us with +their arms reversed, their shields broken, their impresses defaced,—and +so displumed, degraded, and metamorphosed, such unfeathered two-legged +things, that we no longer know them. They are strangers to us. They do +not even go by the names of our ancient lords. Physically they may be +the same men,—though we are not quite sure of that, on your new +philosophic doctrines of personal <a name="Page_531" id="Page_531" title="531" class="pagenum"></a>identity. In all other respects they +are totally changed. We do not see why we have not as good a right to +refuse them their rents as you have to abrogate all their honors, +titles, and distinctions. This we have never commissioned you to do; and +it is one instance among many, indeed, of your assumption of undelegated +power. We see the burghers of Paris, through their clubs, their mobs, +and their national guards, directing you at their pleasure, and giving +that as law to you, which, under your authority, is transmitted as law +to us. Through you, these burghers dispose of the lives and fortunes of +us all. Why should not you attend as much to the desires of the +laborious husbandman with regard to our rent, by which we are affected +in the most serious manner, as you do to the demands of these insolent +burghers relative to distinctions and titles of honor, by which neither +they nor we are affected at all? But we find you pay more regard to +their fancies than to our necessities. Is it among the rights of man to +pay tribute to his equals? Before this measure of yours we might have +thought we were not perfectly equal; we might have entertained some old, +habitual, unmeaning prepossession in favor of those landlords; but we +cannot conceive with what other view than that of destroying all respect +to them you could have made the law that degrades them. You have +forbidden us to treat them with any of the old formalities of respect; +and now you send troops to sabre and to bayonet us into a submission to +fear and force which you did not suffer us to yield to the mild +authority of opinion."</p> + +<p>The ground of some of these arguments is horrid and ridiculous to all +rational ears; but to the politi<a name="Page_532" id="Page_532" title="532" class="pagenum"></a>cians of metaphysics, who have opened +schools for sophistry, and made establishments for anarchy, it is solid +and conclusive. It is obvious, that, on a mere consideration of the +right, the leaders in the Assembly would not in the least have scrupled +to abrogate the rents along with the titles and family ensigns. It would +be only to follow up the principle of their reasonings, and to complete +the analogy of their conduct. But they had newly possessed themselves of +a great body of landed property by confiscation. They had this commodity +at market; and the market would have been wholly destroyed, if they were +to permit the husbandmen to riot in the speculations with which they so +freely intoxicated themselves. The only security which property enjoys +in any one of its descriptions is from the interests of their rapacity +with regard to some other. They have left nothing but their own +arbitrary pleasure to determine what property is to be protected and +what subverted.</p> + +<p>Neither have they left any principle by which any of their +municipalities can be bound to obedience,—or even conscientiously +obliged not to separate from the whole, to become independent, or to +connect itself with some other state. The people of Lyons, it seems, +have refused lately to pay taxes. Why should they not? What lawful +authority is there left to exact them? The king imposed some of them. +The old States, methodized by orders, settled the more ancient. They may +say to the Assembly,—"Who are you, that are not our kings, nor the +States we have elected, nor sit on the principles on which we have +elected you? And who are we, that, when we see the <i>gabelles</i> which you +have ordered to be paid wholly shaken off, when we see the act of +disobedience after<a name="Page_533" id="Page_533" title="533" class="pagenum"></a>wards ratified by yourselves, who are we, that we are +not to judge what taxes we ought or ought not to pay, and are not to +avail ourselves of the same powers the validity of which you have +approved in others?" To this the answer is, "We will send troops." The +last reason of kings is always the first with your Assembly. This +military aid may serve for a time, whilst the impression of the increase +of pay remains, and the vanity of being umpires in all disputes is +flattered. But this weapon will snap short, unfaithful to the hand that +employs it. The Assembly keep a school, where, systematically, and with +unremitting perseverance, they teach principles and form regulations +destructive to all spirit of subordination, civil and military,—and +then they expect that they shall hold in obedience an anarchic people by +an anarchic army.</p> + +<p>The municipal army, which, according to their new policy, is to balance +this national army, if considered in itself only, is of a constitution +much more simple, and in every respect less exceptionable. It is a mere +democratic body, unconnected with the crown or the kingdom, armed and +trained and officered at the pleasure of the districts to which the +corps severally belong; and the personal service of the individuals who +compose, or the fine in lieu of personal service, are directed by the +same authority.<a name="FNanchor_130_131" id="FNanchor_130_131"></a><a href="#Footnote_130_131" class="fnanchor" title=" I see by M. Necker's account, that the national guards of +Paris have received, over and above the money levied within their own +city, about 145,000_l._ sterling out of the public treasure. Whether +this be an actual payment for the nine months of their existence, or an +estimate of their yearly charge, I do not clearly perceive. It is of no +great importance, as certainly they may take whatever they please.">[130]</a> Nothing is more uniform. If, however, considered in +any relation to the crown, to the National Assem<a name="Page_534" id="Page_534" title="534" class="pagenum"></a>bly, to the public +tribunals, or to the other army, or considered in a view to any +coherence or connection between its parts, it seems a monster, and can +hardly fail to terminate its perplexed movements in some great national +calamity. It is a worse preservative of a general constitution than the +systasis of Crete, or the confederation of Poland, or any other +ill-devised corrective which has yet been imagined, in the necessities +produced by an ill-constructed system of government.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>Having concluded my few remarks on the constitution of the supreme +power, the executive, the judicature, the military, and on the +reciprocal relation of all these establishments, I shall say something +of the ability showed by your legislators with regard to the revenue.</p> + +<p>In their proceedings relative to this object, if possible, still fewer +traces appear of political judgment or financial resource. When the +States met, it seemed to be the great object to improve the system of +revenue, to enlarge its collection, to cleanse it of oppression and +vexation, and to establish it on the most solid footing. Great were the +expectations entertained on that head throughout Europe. It was by this +grand arrangement that France was to stand or fall; and this became, in +my opinion very properly, the test by which the skill and patriotism of +those who ruled in that Assembly would be tried. The revenue of the +state is the state. In effect, all depends upon it, whether for support +or for reformation. The dignity of every occupation wholly depends upon +the quantity and the kind of virtue that may be exerted in it. As all +great qualities of the mind which op<a name="Page_535" id="Page_535" title="535" class="pagenum"></a>erate in public, and are not merely +suffering and passive, require force for their display, I had almost +said for their unequivocal existence, the revenue, which is the spring +of all power, becomes in its administration the sphere of every active +virtue. Public virtue, being of a nature magnificent and splendid, +instituted for great things, and conversant about great concerns, +requires abundant scope and room, and cannot spread and grow under +confinement, and in circumstances straitened, narrow, and sordid. +Through the revenue alone the body politic can act in its true genius +and character; and therefore it will display just as much of its +collective virtue, and as much of that virtue which may characterize +those who move it, and are, as it were, its life and guiding principle, +as it is possessed of a just revenue. For from hence not only +magnanimity, and liberality, and beneficence, and fortitude, and +providence, and the tutelary protection of all good arts derive their +food, and the growth of their organs, but continence, and self-denial, +and labor, and vigilance, and frugality, and whatever else there is in +which the mind shows itself above the appetite, are nowhere more in +their proper element than in the provision and distribution of the +public wealth. It is therefore not without reason that the science of +speculative and practical finance, which must take to its aid so many +auxiliary branches of knowledge, stands high in the estimation not only +of the ordinary sort, but of the wisest and best men; and as this +science has grown with the progress of its object, the prosperity and +improvement of nations has generally increased with the increase of +their revenues; and they will both continue to grow and flourish as long +as the balance between what is left <a name="Page_536" id="Page_536" title="536" class="pagenum"></a>to strengthen the efforts of +individuals and what is collected for the common efforts of the state +bear to each other a due reciprocal proportion, and are kept in a close +correspondence and communication. And perhaps it may be owing to the +greatness of revenues, and to the urgency of state necessities, that old +abuses in the constitution of finances are discovered, and their true +nature and rational theory comes to be more perfectly understood; +insomuch that a smaller revenue might have been more distressing in one +period than a far greater is found to be in another, the proportionate +wealth even remaining the same. In this state of things, the French +Assembly found something in their revenues to preserve, to secure, and +wisely to administer, as well as to abrogate and alter. Though their +proud assumption might justify the severest tests, yet, in trying their +abilities on their financial proceedings, I would only consider what is +the plain, obvious duty of a common finance minister, and try them upon +that, and not upon models of ideal perfection.</p> + +<p>The objects of a financier are, then, to secure an ample revenue; to +impose it with judgment and equality; to employ it economically; and +when necessity obliges him to make use of credit, to secure its +foundations in that instance, and forever, by the clearness and candor +of his proceedings, the exactness of his calculations, and the solidity +of his funds. On these heads we may take a short and distinct view of +the merits and abilities of those in the National Assembly who have +taken to themselves the management of this arduous concern.</p> + +<p>Far from any increase of revenue in their hands, I find, by a report of +M. Vernier, from the Committee <a name="Page_537" id="Page_537" title="537" class="pagenum"></a>of Finances, of the second of August +last, that the amount of the national revenue, as compared with its +produce before the Revolution, was diminished by the sum of two hundred +millions, or <i>eight millions sterling</i>, of the annual +income,—considerably more than one third of the whole.</p> + +<p>If this be the result of great ability, never surely was ability +displayed in a more distinguished manner or with so powerful an effect. +No common folly, no vulgar incapacity, no ordinary official negligence, +even no official crime, no corruption, no peculation, hardly any direct +hostility, which we have seen in the modern world, could in so short a +time have made so complete an overthrow of the finances, and, with them, +of the strength of a great kingdom.—<i>Cedo quî vestram rempublicam +tantam amisistis tam cito?</i></p> + +<p>The sophisters and declaimers, as soon as the Assembly met, began with +decrying the ancient constitution of the revenue in many of its most +essential branches, such as the public monopoly of salt. They charged +it, as truly as unwisely, with being ill-contrived, oppressive, and +partial. This representation they were not satisfied to make use of in +speeches preliminary to some plan of reform; they declared it in a +solemn resolution or public sentence, as it were judicially passed upon +it; and this they dispersed throughout the nation. At the time they +passed the decree, with the same gravity they ordered the same absurd, +oppressive, and partial tax to be paid, until they could find a revenue +to replace it. The consequence was inevitable. The provinces which had +been always exempted from this salt monopoly, some of whom were charged +with other contributions, perhaps equivalent, were totally disin<a name="Page_538" id="Page_538" title="538" class="pagenum"></a>clined +to bear any part of the burden, which by an equal distribution was to +redeem the others. As to the Assembly, occupied as it was with the +declaration and violation of the rights of men, and with their +arrangements for general confusion, it had neither leisure nor capacity +to contrive, nor authority to enforce, any plan of any kind relative to +the replacing the tax, or equalizing it, or compensating the provinces, +or for conducting their minds to any scheme of accommodation with the +other districts which were to be relieved. The people of the salt +provinces, impatient under taxes damned by the authority which had +directed their payment, very soon found their patience exhausted. They +thought themselves as skilful in demolishing as the Assembly could be. +They relieved themselves by throwing off the whole burden. Animated by +this example, each district, or part of a district, judging of its own +grievance by its own feeling, and of its remedy by its own opinion, did +as it pleased with other taxes.</p> + +<p>We are next to see how they have conducted themselves in contriving +equal impositions, proportioned to the means of the citizens, and the +least likely to lean heavy on the active capital employed in the +generation of that private wealth from whence the public fortune must be +derived. By suffering the several districts, and several of the +individuals in each district, to judge of what part of the old revenue +they might withhold, instead of better principles of equality, a new +inequality was introduced of the most oppressive kind. Payments were +regulated by dispositions. The parts of the kingdom which were the most +submissive, the most orderly, or the most affectionate to the +commonwealth, bore the whole burden of the state.<a name="Page_539" id="Page_539" title="539" class="pagenum"></a> Nothing turns out to +be so oppressive and unjust as a feeble government. To fill up all the +deficiencies in the old impositions, and the new deficiencies of every +kind which were to be expected, what remained to a state without +authority? The National Assembly called for a voluntary +benevolence,—for a fourth part of the income of all the citizens, to be +estimated on the honor of those who were to pay. They obtained something +more than could be rationally calculated, but what was far indeed from +answerable to their real necessities, and much less to their fond +expectations. Rational people could have hoped for little from this +their tax in the disguise of a benevolence,—tax weak, ineffective, and +unequal,—a tax by which luxury, avarice, and selfishness were screened, +and the load thrown upon productive capital, upon integrity, generosity, +and public spirit,—a tax of regulation upon virtue. At length the mask +is thrown off, and they are now trying means (with little success) of +exacting their benevolence by force.</p> + +<p>This benevolence, the rickety offspring of weakness, was to be supported +by another resource, the twin brother of the same prolific imbecility. +The patriotic donations were to make good the failure of the patriotic +contribution. John Doe was to become security for Richard Roe. By this +scheme they took things of much price from the giver, comparatively of +small value to the receiver; they ruined several trades; they pillaged +the crown of its ornaments, the churches of their plate, and the people +of their personal decorations. The invention of those juvenile +pretenders to liberty was in reality nothing more than a servile +imitation of one of the poorest resources of doting despotism. They took +an old, huge, full-bottomed periwig <a name="Page_540" id="Page_540" title="540" class="pagenum"></a>out of the wardrobe of the +antiquated frippery of Louis the Fourteenth, to cover the premature +baldness of the National Assembly. They produced this old-fashioned +formal folly, though it had been so abundantly exposed in the Memoirs of +the Duke de Saint-Simon,—if to reasonable men it had wanted any +arguments to display its mischief and insufficiency. A device of the +same kind was tried in my memory by Louis the Fifteenth, but it answered +at no time. However, the necessities of ruinous wars were some excuse +for desperate projects. The deliberations of calamity are rarely wise. +But here was a season for disposition and providence. It was in a time +of profound peace, then enjoyed for five years, and promising a much +longer continuance, that they had recourse to this desperate trifling. +They were sure to lose more reputation by sporting, in their serious +situation, with these toys and playthings of finance, which have filled +half their journals, than could possibly be compensated by the poor +temporary supply which they afforded. It seemed as if those who adopted +such projects were wholly ignorant of their circumstances, or wholly +unequal to their necessities. Whatever virtue may be in these devices, +it is obvious that neither the patriotic gifts nor the patriotic +contribution can ever be resorted to again. The resources of public +folly are soon exhausted. The whole, indeed, of their scheme of revenue +is to make, by any artifice, an appearance of a full reservoir for the +hour, whilst at the same time they cut off the springs and living +fountains of perennial supply. The account not long since furnished by +M. Necker was meant, without question, to be favorable. He gives a +flattering view of the means of getting through the year; but he +ex<a name="Page_541" id="Page_541" title="541" class="pagenum"></a>presses, as it is natural he should, some apprehension for that which +was to succeed. On this last prognostic, instead of entering into the +grounds of this apprehension, in order, by a proper foresight, to +prevent the prognosticated evil, M. Necker receives a sort of friendly +reprimand from the President of the Assembly.</p> + +<p>As to their other schemes of taxation, it is impossible to say anything +of them with certainty, because they have not yet had their operation; +but nobody is so sanguine as to imagine they will fill up any +perceptible part of the wide gaping breach which their incapacity has +made in their revenues. At present the state of their treasury sinks +every day more and more in cash, and swells more and more in fictitious +representation. When so little within or without is now found but paper, +the representative not of opulence, but of want, the creature not of +credit, but of power, they imagine that our flourishing state in England +is owing to that bank-paper, and not the bank-paper to the flourishing +condition of our commerce, to the solidity of our credit, and to the +total exclusion of all idea of power from any part of the transaction. +They forget that in England not one shilling of paper money of any +description is received but of choice,—that the whole has had its +origin in cash actually deposited,—and that it is convertible at +pleasure, in an instant, and without the smallest loss, into cash again. +Our paper is of value in commerce, because in law it is of none. It is +powerful on 'Change, because in Westminster Hall it is impotent. In +payment of a debt of twenty shillings a creditor may refuse all the +paper of the Bank of England. Nor is there amongst us a single public +<a name="Page_542" id="Page_542" title="542" class="pagenum"></a>security, of any quality or nature whatsoever, that is enforced by +authority. In fact, it might be easily shown that our paper wealth, +instead of lessening the real coin, has a tendency to increase +it,—instead of being a substitute for money, it only facilitates its +entry, its exit, and its circulation,—that it is the symbol of +prosperity, and not the badge of distress. Never was a scarcity of cash +and an exuberance of paper a subject of complaint in this nation.</p> + +<p>Well! but a lessening of prodigal expenses, and the economy which has +been introduced by the virtuous and sapient Assembly, make amends for +the losses sustained in the receipt of revenue. In this at least they +have fulfilled the duty of a financier.—Have those who say so looked at +the expenses of the National Assembly itself? of the municipalities? of +the city of Paris? of the increased pay of the two armies? of the new +police? of the new judicatures? Have they even carefully compared the +present pension-list with the former? These politicians have been cruel, +not economical. Comparing the expenses of the former prodigal government +and its relation to the then revenues with the expenses of this new +system as opposed to the state of its new treasury, I believe the +present will be found beyond all comparison more chargeable.<a name="FNanchor_131_132" id="FNanchor_131_132"></a><a href="#Footnote_131_132" class="fnanchor" title=" The reader will observe that I have but lightly touched +(my plan demanded nothing more) on the condition of the French finances +as connected with the demands upon them. If I had intended to do +otherwise, the materials in my hands for such a task are not altogether +perfect. On this subject I refer the reader to M. de Calonne's work, and +the tremendous display that he has made of the havoc and devastation in +the public estate, and in all the affairs of France, caused by the +presumptuous good intentions of ignorance and incapacity. Such effects +those causes will always produce. Looking over that account with a +pretty strict eye, and, with perhaps too much rigor, deducting +everything which may be placed to the account of a financier out of +place, who might be supposed by his enemies desirous of making the most +of his cause, I believe it will be found that a more salutary lesson of +caution against the daring spirit of innovators than what has been +supplied at the expense of France never was at any time furnished to +mankind.">[131]</a></p> + +<p>It remains only to consider the proofs of financial <a name="Page_543" id="Page_543" title="543" class="pagenum"></a>ability furnished +by the present French managers when they are to raise supplies on +credit. Here I am a little at a stand; for credit, properly speaking, +they have none. The credit of the ancient government was not, indeed, +the best; but they could always, on some terms, command money, not only +at home, but from most of the countries of Europe where a surplus +capital was accumulated; and the credit of that government was improving +daily. The establishment of a system of liberty would of course be +supposed to give it new strength: and so it would actually have done, if +a system of liberty had been established. What offers has their +government of pretended liberty had from Holland, from Hamburg, from +Switzerland, from Genoa, from England, for a dealing in their paper? Why +should these nations of commerce and economy enter into any pecuniary +dealings with a people who attempt to reverse the very nature of +things,—amongst whom they see the debtor prescribing at the point of +the bayonet the medium of his solvency to the creditor, discharging one +of his engagements with another, turning his very penury into his +resource, and paying his interest with his rags?</p> + +<p>Their fanatical confidence in the omnipotence of Church plunder has +induced these philosophers to overlook all care of the public estate, +just as the <a name="Page_544" id="Page_544" title="544" class="pagenum"></a>dream of the philosopher's stone induces dupes, under the +more plausible delusion of the hermetic art, to neglect all rational +means of improving their fortunes. With these philosophic financiers, +this universal medicine made of Church mummy is to cure all the evils of +the state. These gentlemen perhaps do not believe a great deal in the +miracles of piety; but it cannot be questioned that they have an +undoubting faith in the prodigies of sacrilege. Is there a debt which +presses them? Issue <i>assignats</i>. Are compensations to be made or a +maintenance decreed to those whom they have robbed of their freehold in +their office or expelled from their profession? <i>Assignats</i>. Is a fleet +to be fitted out? <i>Assignats</i>. If sixteen millions sterling of these +<i>assignats</i> forced on the people leave the wants of the state as urgent +as ever, Issue, says one, thirty millions sterling of <i>assignats</i>,—says +another, Issue fourscore millions more of <i>assignats</i>. The only +difference among their financial factions is on the greater or the +lesser quantity of <i>assignats</i> to be imposed on the public sufferance. +They are all professors of <i>assignats</i>. Even those whose natural good +sense and knowledge of commerce, not obliterated by philosophy, furnish +decisive arguments against this delusion, conclude their arguments by +proposing the emission of <i>assignats</i>. I suppose they must talk of +<i>assignats</i>, as no other language would be understood. All experience of +their inefficacy does not in the least discourage them. Are the old +<i>assignats</i> depreciated at market? What is the remedy? Issue new +<i>assignats</i>.—<i>Mais si maladia opiniatria non vult se garire, quid illi +facere? Assignare; postea assignare; ensuita assignare</i>. The word is a +trifle altered. The Latin of your present doctors <a name="Page_545" id="Page_545" title="545" class="pagenum"></a>may be better than +that of your old comedy; their wisdom and the variety of their resources +are the same. They have not more notes in their song than the cuckoo; +though, far from the softness of that harbinger of summer and plenty, +their voice is as harsh and as ominous as that of the raven.</p> + +<p>Who but the most desperate adventurers in philosophy and finance could +at all have thought of destroying the settled revenue of the state, the +sole security for the public credit, in the hope of rebuilding it with +the materials of confiscated property? If, however, an excessive zeal +for the state should have led a pious and venerable prelate (by +anticipation a father of the Church<a name="FNanchor_132_133" id="FNanchor_132_133"></a><a href="#Footnote_132_133" class="fnanchor" title=" La Bruyère of Bossuet.">[132]</a>) to pillage his own order, and, +for the good of the Church and people, to take upon himself the place of +grand financier of confiscation and comptroller-general of sacrilege, he +and his coadjutors were, in my opinion, bound to show, by their +subsequent conduct, that they knew something of the office they assumed. +When they had resolved to appropriate to the <i>fisc</i> a certain portion of +the landed property of their conquered country, it was their business to +render their bank a real fund of credit,—as far as such a bank was +capable of becoming so.</p> + +<p>To establish a current circulating credit upon any <i>land-bank</i>, under +any circumstances whatsoever, has hitherto proved difficult at the very +least. The attempt has commonly ended in bankruptcy. But when the +Assembly were led, through a contempt of moral, to a defiance of +economical principles, it might at least have been expected that nothing +would be omitted on their part to lessen this difficulty, to pre<a name="Page_546" id="Page_546" title="546" class="pagenum"></a>vent +any aggravation of this bankruptcy. It might be expected, that, to +render your land-bank tolerable, every means would be adopted that could +display openness and candor in the statement of the security, everything +which could aid the recovery of the demand. To take things in their most +favorable point of view, your condition was that of a man of a large +landed estate which he wished to dispose of for the discharge of a debt +and the supply of certain services. Not being able instantly to sell, +you wished to mortgage. What would a man of fair intentions and a +commonly clear understanding do in such circumstances? Ought he not +first to ascertain the gross value of the estate, the charges of its +management and disposition, the incumbrances perpetual and temporary of +all kinds that affect it,—then, striking a net surplus, to calculate +the just value of the security? When that surplus (the only security to +the creditor) had been clearly ascertained, and properly vested in the +hands of trustees, then he would indicate the parcels to be sold, and +the time and conditions of sale; after this he would admit the public +creditor, if he chose it, to subscribe his stock into this new fund,—or +he might receive proposals for an <i>assignat</i> from those who would +advance money to purchase this species of security. This would be to +proceed like men of business, methodically and rationally, and on the +only principles of public and private credit that have an existence. The +dealer would then know exactly what he purchased; and the only doubt +which could hang upon his mind would be the dread of the resumption of +the spoil, which one day might be made (perhaps with an addition of +punishment) from the sacrilegious gripe of those <a name="Page_547" id="Page_547" title="547" class="pagenum"></a>execrable wretches who +could become purchasers at the auction of their innocent +fellow-citizens.</p> + +<p>An open, and exact statement of the clear value of the property, and of +the time, the circumstances, and the place of sale, were all necessary, +to efface as much as possible the stigma that has hitherto been branded +on every kind of land-bank. It became necessary on another +principle,—that is, on account of a pledge of faith previously given on +that subject, that their future fidelity in a slippery concern might be +established by their adherence to their first engagement. When they had +finally determined on a state resource from Church booty, they came, on +the fourteenth of April, 1790, to a solemn resolution on the subject, +and pledged themselves to their country, "that, in the statement of the +public charges for each year, there should be brought to account a sum +sufficient for defraying the expenses of the R.C.A. religion, the +support of the ministers at the altars, the relief of the poor, the +pensions to the ecclesiastics, secular as well as regular, of the one +and of the other sex, <i>in order that the estates and goods which are at +the disposal of the nation may be disengaged of all charges, and +employed by the representatives, or the legislative body, to the great +and most pressing exigencies of the state."</i> They further engaged, on +the same day, that the sum necessary for the year 1791 should be +forthwith determined.</p> + +<p>In this resolution they admit it their duty to show distinctly the +expense of the above objects, which, by other resolutions, they had +before engaged should be first in the order of provision. They admit +that they ought to show the estate clear and disengaged of all charges, +and that they should show it immediately.<a name="Page_548" id="Page_548" title="548" class="pagenum"></a> Have they done this +immediately, or at any time? Have they ever furnished a rent-roll of the +immovable estate, or given in an inventory of the movable effects, which +they confiscate to their assignats? In what manner they can fulfil their +engagements of holding out to public service "an estate disengaged of +all charges," without authenticating the value of the estate or the +quantum of the charges, I leave it to their English admirers to explain. +Instantly upon this assurance, and previously to any one step towards +making it good, they issue, on the credit of so handsome a declaration, +sixteen millions sterling of their paper. This was manly. Who, after +this masterly stroke, can doubt of their abilities in finance?—But +then, before any other emission of these financial <i>indulgences</i>, they +took care at least to make good their original promise.—If such +estimate, either of the value of the estate or the amount of the +incumbrances, has been made, it has escaped me. I never heard of it.</p> + +<p>At length they have spoken out, and they have made a full discovery of +their abominable fraud in holding out the Church lands as a security for +any debts or any service whatsoever. They rob only to enable them to +cheat; but in a very short time they defeat the ends both of the robbery +and the fraud, by making out accounts for other purposes, which blow up +their whole apparatus of force and of deception. I am obliged to M. de +Calonne for his reference to the document which proves this +extraordinary fact: it had by some means escaped me. Indeed, it was not +necessary to make out my assertion as to the breach of faith on the +declaration of the fourteenth of April, 1790. By a report of their +committee it now <a name="Page_549" id="Page_549" title="549" class="pagenum"></a>appears that the charge of keeping up the reduced +ecclesiastical establishments, and other expenses attendant on religion, +and maintaining the religious of both sexes, retained or pensioned, and +the other concomitant expenses of the same nature, which they have +brought upon themselves by this convulsion in property, exceeds the +income of the estates acquired by it in the enormous sum of two millions +sterling annually,—besides a debt of seven millions and upwards. These +are the calculating powers of imposture! This is the finance of +philosophy! This is the result of all the delusions held out to engage a +miserable people in rebellion, murder, and sacrilege, and to make them +prompt and zealous instruments in the ruin of their country! Never did a +state, in any case, enrich itself by the confiscations of the citizens. +This new experiment has succeeded like all the rest. Every honest mind, +every true lover of liberty and humanity, must rejoice to find that +injustice is not always good policy, nor rapine the high-road to riches. +I subjoin with pleasure, in a note, the able and spirited observations +of M. de Calonne on this subject.<a name="FNanchor_133_134" id="FNanchor_133_134"></a><a href="#Footnote_133_134" class="fnanchor" title=" "Ce n'est point à l'assemblée entière que je m'adresse +ici; je ne parle qu'à ceux qui l'égarent, en lui cachant sous des gazes +séduisantes le but où ils l'entraînent. C'est à eux que je dis: Votre +objet, vous n'en disconviendrez pas, c'est d'ôter tout espoir au clergé, +et de consommer sa ruine; c'est-là, en ne vous soupçonnant d'aucune +combinaison de cupidité, d'aucun regard sur le jeu des effets publics, +c'est-là ce qu'on doit croire que vous avez en vue dans la terrible +opération que vous proposez; c'est ce qui doit en être le fruit. Mais le +peuple qui vous y intéressez, quel avantage peut-il y trouver? En vous +servant sans cesse de lui, que faites-vous pour lui? Rien, absolument +rien; et, au contraire, vous faites ce qui ne conduit qu'à l'accabler de +nouvelles charges. Vous avez rejeté, à son préjudice, une offre de 400 +millions, dont l'acceptation pouvoit devenir un moyen de soulagement en +sa faveur; et à cette ressource, aussi profitable que légitime, vous +avez substitué une injustice ruineuse, qui, de votre propre aveu, charge +le trésor public, et par consequent le peuple, d'un surcroît de dépense +annuelle de 50 millions an moins, et d'un remboursement de 150 millions. + +"Malheureux peuple! voilà ce que vous vaut en dernier résultat +l'expropriation de l'Église, et la dureté des décrets taxateurs du +traitement des ministres d'une religion bienfaisante; et désormais ils +scront à votre charge: leurs charités soulageoient les pauvres; et vous +allez être imposés pour subvenir à leur entretien!"—_De l'État de la +France,_ p. 81. See also p. 92, and the following pages.">[133]</a><a name="Page_550" id="Page_550" title="550" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>In order to persuade the world of the bottomless resource of +ecclesiastical confiscation, the Assembly have proceeded to other +confiscations of estates in offices, which could not be done with any +common color without being compensated out of this grand confiscation of +landed property. They have thrown upon this fund, which was to show a +surplus disengaged of all charges, a new charge, namely, the +compensation to the whole body of the disbanded judicature, and of all +suppressed offices and estates: a charge which I cannot ascertain, but +which unquestionably amounts to many French millions. Another of the new +charges is an annuity of four hundred and eighty thousand pounds +sterling, to be paid (if they choose to keep faith) by daily payments, +for the interest of the first assignats. Have they ever given themselves +the trouble to state fairly the expense of the management of the Church +lands in the hands of the municipalities, to whose care, skill, and +diligence, and that of their legion of unknown under-agents, they have +chosen to commit the charge of the forfeited estates, and the +consequence of which had been so ably pointed out by the Bishop of +Nancy?<a name="Page_551" id="Page_551" title="551" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>But it is unnecessary to dwell on these obvious heads of incumbrance. +Have they made out any clear state of the grand incumbrance of all, I +mean the whole of the general and municipal establishments of all sorts, +and compared it with the regular income by revenue? Every deficiency in +these becomes a charge on the confiscated estate, before the creditor +can plant his cabbages on an acre of Church property. There is no other +prop than this confiscation to keep the whole state from tumbling to the +ground. In this situation they have purposely covered all, that they +ought industriously to have cleared, with a thick fog; and then, +blindfold themselves, like bulls that shut their eyes when they push, +they drive, by the point of the bayonets, their slaves, blindfolded +indeed no worse than their lords, to take their fictions for currencies, +and to swallow down paper pills by thirty-four millions sterling at a +dose. Then they proudly lay in their claim to a future credit, on +failure of all their past engagements, and at a time when (if in such a +matter anything can be clear) it is clear that the surplus estates will +never answer even the first of their mortgages,—I mean that of the four +hundred millions (or sixteen millions sterling) of assignats. In all +this procedure I can discern neither the solid sense of plain dealing +nor the subtle dexterity of ingenious fraud. The objections within the +Assembly to pulling up the flood-gates for this inundation of fraud are +unanswered; but they are thoroughly refuted by an hundred thousand +financiers in the street. These are the numbers by which the metaphysic +arithmeticians compute. These are the grand calculations on which a +philosophical public credit is founded in France. They cannot raise +supplies; but they can <a name="Page_552" id="Page_552" title="552" class="pagenum"></a>raise mobs. Let them rejoice in the applauses of +the club at Dundee for their wisdom and patriotism in having thus +applied the plunder of the citizens to the service of the state. I hear +of no address upon this subject from the directors of the Bank of +England,—though their approbation would be of a <i>little</i> more weight in +the scale of credit than that of the club at Dundee. But to do justice +to the club, I believe the gentlemen who compose it to be wiser than +they appear,—that they will be less liberal of their money than of +their addresses, and that they would not give a dog's ear of their most +rumpled and ragged Scotch paper for twenty of your fairest assignats.</p> + +<p>Early in this year the Assembly issued paper to the amount of sixteen +millions sterling. What must have been the state into which the Assembly +has brought your affairs, that the relief afforded by so vast a supply +has been hardly perceptible? This paper also felt an almost immediate +depreciation of five per cent, which in a little time came to about +seven. The effect of these assignats on the receipt of the revenue is +remarkable. M. Necker found that the collectors of the revenue, who +received in coin, paid the treasury in assignats. The collectors made +seven per cent by thus receiving in money, and accounting in depreciated +paper. It was not very difficult to foresee that this must be +inevitable. It was, however, not the less embarrassing. M. Necker was +obliged (I believe, for a considerable part, in the market of London) to +buy gold and silver for the mint, which amounted to about twelve +thousand pounds above the value of the commodity gained. That minister +was of opinion, that, whatever their secret nutritive virtue might be, +the state could not <a name="Page_553" id="Page_553" title="553" class="pagenum"></a>live upon assignats alone,—that some real silver +was necessary, particularly for the satisfaction of those who, having +iron in their hands, were not likely to distinguish themselves for +patience, when they should perceive, that, whilst an increase of pay was +held out to them in real money, it was again to be fraudulently drawn +back by depreciated paper. The minister, in this very natural distress, +applied to the Assembly, that they should order the collectors to pay in +specie what in specie they had received. It could not escape him, that, +if the Treasury paid three per cent for the use of a currency which +should be returned seven per cent worse than the minister issued it, +such a dealing could not very greatly tend to enrich the public. The +Assembly took no notice of his recommendation. They were in this +dilemma: If they continued to receive the assignats, cash must become an +alien to their Treasury; if the Treasury should refuse those paper +<i>amulets</i>, or should discountenance them in any degree, they must +destroy the credit of their sole resource. They seem, then, to have made +their option, and to have given some sort of credit to their paper by +taking it themselves; at the same time, in their speeches, they made a +sort of swaggering declaration, something, I rather think, above +legislative competence,—that is, that there is no difference in value +between metallic money and their assignats. This was a good, stout, +proof article of faith, pronounced under an anathema by the venerable +fathers of this philosophic synod. <i>Credat</i> who will,—certainly not +<i>Judæus Apella</i>.</p> + +<p>A noble indignation rises in the minds of your popular leaders, on +hearing the magic-lantern in their show of finance compared to the +fraudulent <a name="Page_554" id="Page_554" title="554" class="pagenum"></a>exhibitions of Mr. Law. They cannot bear to hear the sands +of his Mississippi compared with the rock of the Church, on which they +build their system. Pray let them suppress this glorious spirit, until +they show to the world what piece of solid ground there is for their +assignats, which they have not preoccupied by other charges. They do +injustice to that great mother fraud, to compare it with their +degenerate imitation. It is not true that Law built solely on a +speculation concerning the Mississippi. He added the East India trade; +he added the African trade; he added the farms of all the farmed revenue +of France. All these together unquestionably could not support the +structure which the public enthusiasm, not he, chose to build upon these +bases. But these were, however, in comparison, generous delusions. They +supposed, and they aimed at, an increase of the commerce of France. They +opened to it the whole range of the two hemispheres. They did not think +of feeding France from its own substance. A grand imagination found in +this flight of commerce something to captivate. It was wherewithal to +dazzle the eye of an eagle. It was not made to entice the smell of a +mole, nuzzling and burying himself in his mother earth, as yours is. Men +were not then quite shrunk from their natural dimensions by a degrading +and sordid philosophy, and fitted for low and vulgar deceptions. Above +all, remember, that, in imposing on the imagination, the then managers +of the system made a compliment to the freedom of men. In their fraud +there was no mixture of force. This was reserved to our time, to quench +the little glimmerings of reason which might break in upon the solid +darkness of this enlightened age.<a name="Page_555" id="Page_555" title="555" class="pagenum"></a></p> + +<p>On recollection, I have said nothing of a scheme of finance which may be +urged in favor of the abilities of these gentlemen, and which has been +introduced with great pomp, though not yet finally adopted in the +National Assembly. It comes with something solid in aid of the credit of +the paper circulation; and much has been said of its utility and its +elegance. I mean the project for coining into money the bells of the +suppressed churches. This is their alchemy. There are some follies which +baffle argument, which go beyond ridicule, and which excite no feeling +in us but disgust; and therefore I say no more upon it.</p> + +<p>It is as little worth remarking any farther upon all their drawing and +re-drawing, on their circulation for putting off the evil day, on the +play between the Treasury and the <i>Caisse d'Escompte</i>, and on all these +old, exploded contrivances of mercantile fraud, now exalted into policy +of state. The revenue will not be trifled with. The prattling about the +rights of men will not be accepted in payment of a biscuit or a pound of +gunpowder. Here, then, the metaphysicians descend from their airy +speculations, and faithfully follow examples. What examples? The +examples of bankrupts. But defeated, baffled, disgraced, when their +breath, their strength, their inventions, their fancies desert them, +their confidence still maintains its ground. In the manifest failure of +their abilities, they take credit for their benevolence. When the +revenue disappears in their hands, they have the presumption, in some of +their late proceedings, to value <i>themselves</i> on the relief given to the +people. They did not relieve the people. If they entertained such +intentions, why did they order the obnoxious taxes <a name="Page_556" id="Page_556" title="556" class="pagenum"></a>to be paid? The +people relieved themselves, in spite of the Assembly.</p> + +<p>But waiving all discussion on the parties who may claim the merit of +this fallacious relief, has there been, in effect, any relief to the +people in any form? M. Bailly, one of the grand agents of paper +circulation, lets you into the nature of this relief. His speech to the +National Assembly contained a high and labored panegyric on the +inhabitants of Paris, for the constancy and unbroken resolution with +which they have borne their distress and misery. A fine picture of +public felicity! What! great courage and unconquerable firmness of mind +to endure benefits and sustain redress? One would think, from the speech +of this learned lord mayor, that the Parisians, for this twelvemonth +past, had been suffering the straits of some dreadful blockade,—that +Henry the Fourth had been stopping up the avenues to their supply, and +Sully thundering with his ordnance at the gates of Paris,—when in +reality they are besieged by no other enemies than their own madness and +folly, their own credulity and perverseness. But M. Bailly will sooner +thaw the eternal ice of his Atlantic regions than restore the central +heat to Paris, whilst it remains "smitten with the cold, dry, petrific +mace" of a false and unfeeling philosophy. Some time after this speech, +that is, on the thirteenth of last August, the same magistrate, giving +an account of his government at the bar of the same Assembly, expresses +himself as follows:—"In the month of July, 1789," (the period of +everlasting commemoration,) "the finances of the city of Paris were +<i>yet</i> in good order; the expenditure was counterbalanced by the receipt, +and she had at that time a million [forty thousand pounds sterling]<a name="Page_557" id="Page_557" title="557" class="pagenum"></a> in +bank. The expenses which she has been constrained to incur, <i>subsequent +to the Revolution</i>, amount to 2,500,000 livres. From these expenses, and +the great falling off in the product of the <i>free gifts</i>, not only a +momentary, but a <i>total</i>, want of money has taken place." This is the +Paris upon whose nourishment, in the course of the last year, such +immense sums, drawn from the vitals of all France, have been expended. +As long as Paris stands in the place of ancient Rome, so long she will +be maintained by the subject provinces. It is an evil inevitably +attendant on the dominion of sovereign democratic republics. As it +happened in Rome, it may survive that republican domination which gave +rise to it. In that case despotism itself must submit to the vices of +popularity. Rome, under her emperors, united the evils of both systems; +and this unnatural combination was one great cause of her ruin.</p> + +<p>To tell the people that they are relieved by the dilapidation of their +public estate is a cruel and insolent imposition. Statesmen, before they +valued themselves on the relief given to the people by the destruction +of their revenue, ought first to have carefully attended to the solution +of this problem:—Whether it be more advantageous to the people to pay +considerably and to gain in proportion, or to gain little or nothing and +to be disburdened of all contribution? My mind is made up to decide in +favor of the first proposition. Experience is with me, and, I believe, +the best opinions also. To keep a balance between the power of +acquisition on the part of the subject and the demands he is to answer +on the part of the state is the fundamental part of the skill of a true +politician. The means of acquisition are prior <a name="Page_558" id="Page_558" title="558" class="pagenum"></a>in time and in +arrangement. Good order is the foundation of all good things. To be +enabled to acquire, the people, without being servile, must be tractable +and obedient. The magistrate must have his reverence, the laws their +authority. The body of the people must not find the principles of +natural subordination by art rooted out of their minds. They must +respect that property of which they cannot partake. They must labor to +obtain what by labor can be obtained; and when they find, as they +commonly do, the success disproportioned to the endeavor, they must be +taught their consolation in the final proportions of eternal justice. Of +this consolation whoever deprives them deadens their industry, and +strikes at the root of all acquisition as of all conservation. He that +does this is the cruel oppressor, the merciless enemy of the poor and +wretched; at the same time that by his wicked speculations he exposes +the fruits of successful industry and the accumulations of fortune to +the plunder of the negligent, the disappointed, and the unprosperous.</p> + +<p>Too many of the financiers by profession are apt to see nothing in +revenue but banks, and circulations, and annuities on lives, and +tontines, and perpetual rents, and all the small wares of the shop. In a +settled order of the state, these things are not to be slighted, nor is +the skill in them to be held of trivial estimation. They are good, but +then only good when they assume the effects of that settled order, and +are built upon it. But when men think that these beggarly contrivances +may supply a resource for the evils which result from breaking up the +foundations of public order, and from causing or suffering the +principles of property to be subverted, they will, <a name="Page_559" id="Page_559" title="559" class="pagenum"></a>in the ruin of their +country, leave a melancholy and lasting monument of the effect of +preposterous politics, and presumptuous, short-sighted, narrow-minded +wisdom.</p> + +<p>The effects of the incapacity shown by the popular leaders in all the +great members of the commonwealth are to be covered with the +"all-atoning name" of Liberty. In some people I see great liberty, +indeed; in many, if not in the most, an oppressive, degrading servitude. +But what is liberty without wisdom and without virtue? It is the +greatest of all possible evils; for it is folly, vice, and madness, +without tuition or restraint. Those who know what virtuous liberty is +cannot bear to see it disgraced by incapable heads, on account of their +having high-sounding words in their mouths. Grand, swelling sentiments +of liberty I am sure I do not despise. They warm the heart; they enlarge +and liberalize our minds; they animate our courage in a time of +conflict. Old as I am, I read the fine raptures of Lucan and Corneille +with pleasure. Neither do I wholly condemn the little arts and devices +of popularity. They facilitate the carrying of many points of moment; +they keep the people together; they refresh the mind in its exertions; +and they diffuse occasional gayety over the severe brow of moral +freedom. Every politician ought to sacrifice to the Graces, and to join +compliance with reason. But in such an undertaking as that in France all +these subsidiary sentiments and artifices are of little avail. To make a +government requires no great prudence. Settle the seat of power, teach +obedience, and the work is done. To give freedom is still more easy. It +is not necessary to guide; it only requires to let <a name="Page_560" id="Page_560" title="560" class="pagenum"></a>go the rein. But to +form a <i>free government</i>, that is, to temper together these opposite +elements of liberty and restraint in one consistent work, requires much +thought, deep reflection, a sagacious, powerful, and combining mind. +This I do not find in those who take the lead in the National Assembly. +Perhaps they are not so miserably deficient as they appear. I rather +believe it. It would put them below the common level of human +understanding. But when the leaders choose to make themselves bidders at +an auction of popularity, their talents, in the construction of the +state, will be of no service. They will become flatterers instead of +legislators,—the instruments, not the guides of the people. If any of +them should happen to propose a scheme of liberty soberly limited, and +defined with proper qualifications, he will be immediately outbid by his +competitors, who will produce something more splendidly popular. +Suspicions will be raised of his fidelity to his cause. Moderation will +be stigmatized as the virtue of cowards, and compromise as the prudence +of traitors,—until, in hopes of preserving the credit which may enable +him to temper and moderate on some occasions, the popular leader is +obliged to become active in propagating doctrines and establishing +powers that will afterwards defeat any sober purpose at which he +ultimately might have aimed.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>But am I so unreasonable as to see nothing at all that deserves +commendation in the indefatigable labors of this Assembly? I do not +deny, that, among an infinite number of acts of violence and folly, some +good may have been done. They who destroy everything certainly will +remove some grievance. They <a name="Page_561" id="Page_561" title="561" class="pagenum"></a>who make everything new have a chance that +they may establish something beneficial. To give them credit for what +they have done in virtue of the authority they have usurped, or to +excuse them in the crimes by which that authority has been acquired, it +must appear that the same things could not have been accomplished +without producing such a revolution. Most assuredly they might; because +almost every one of the regulations made by them, which is not very +equivocal, was either in the cession of the king, voluntarily made at +the meeting of the States, or in the concurrent instructions to the +orders. Some usages have been abolished on just grounds; but they were +such, that, if they had stood as they were to all eternity, they would +little detract from the happiness and prosperity of any state. The +improvements of the National Assembly are superficial, their errors +fundamental.</p> + +<p>Whatever they are, I wish my countrymen rather to recommend to our +neighbors the example of the British Constitution than to take models +from them for the improvement of our own. In the former they have got an +invaluable treasure. They are not, I think, without some causes of +apprehension and complaint; but these they do not owe to their +Constitution, but to their own conduct. I think our happy situation +owing to our Constitution,—but owing to the whole of it, and not to any +part singly,—owing in a great measure to what we have left standing in +our several reviews and reformations, as well as to what we have altered +or superadded. Our people will find employment enough for a truly +patriotic, free, and independent spirit, in guarding what they possess +from violation. I would not exclude alteration nei<a name="Page_562" id="Page_562" title="562" class="pagenum"></a>ther; but even when I +changed, it should be to preserve. I should be led to my remedy by a +great grievance. In what I did, I should follow the example of our +ancestors. I would make the reparation as nearly as possible in the +style of the building. A politic caution, a guarded circumspection, a +moral rather than a complexional timidity, were among the ruling +principles of our forefathers in their most decided conduct. Not being +illuminated with the light of which the gentlemen of France tell us they +have got so abundant a, share, they acted under a strong impression of +the ignorance and fallibility of mankind. He that had made them thus +fallible rewarded them for having in their conduct attended to their +nature. Let us imitate their caution, if we wish to deserve their +fortune or to retain their bequests. Let us add, if we please, but let +us preserve what they have left; and standing on the firm ground of the +British Constitution, let us be satisfied to admire, rather than attempt +to follow in their desperate flights, the aëronauts of France.</p> + +<p>I have told you candidly my sentiments. I think they are not likely to +alter yours. I do not know that they ought. You are young; you cannot +guide, but must follow, the fortune of your country. But hereafter they +may be of some use to you, in some future form which your commonwealth +may take. In the present it can hardly remain; but before its final +settlement, it may be obliged to pass, as one of our poets says, +"through great varieties of untried being," and in all its +transmigrations to be purified by fire and blood.</p> + +<p>I have little to recommend my opinions but long observation and much +impartiality. They come from <a name="Page_563" id="Page_563" title="563" class="pagenum"></a>one who has been no tool of power, no +flatterer of greatness, and who in his last acts does not wish to belie +the tenor of his life. They come from one almost the whole of whose +public exertion has been a struggle for the liberty of others,—from one +in whose breast no anger durable or vehement has ever been kindled but +by what he considered as tyranny, and who snatches from his share in the +endeavors which are used by good men to discredit opulent oppression the +hours he has employed on your affairs, and who in so doing persuades +himself he has not departed from his usual office. They come from one +who desires honors, distinctions, and emoluments but little, and who +expects them not at all,—who has no contempt for fame, and no fear of +obloquy,—who shuns contention, though he will hazard an opinion; from +one who wishes to preserve consistency, but who would preserve +consistency by varying his means to secure the unity of his end,—and, +when the equipoise of the vessel in which he sails may be endangered by +overloading it upon one side, is desirous of carrying the small weight +of his reasons to that which may preserve its equipoise.</p> + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_77_77" id="Footnote_77_77" /><a href="#FNanchor_77_77"><span class="label">[77]</span></a> Ps. cxlix.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_78_78" id="Footnote_78_78" /><a href="#FNanchor_78_78"><span class="label">[78]</span></a> Discourse on the Love of our Country, Nov. 4, 1789, by Dr. +Richard Price, 3d edition, p. 17 and 18.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_79_79" id="Footnote_79_79" /><a href="#FNanchor_79_79"><span class="label">[79]</span></a> "Those who dislike that mode of worship which is +prescribed by public authority ought, if they can find <i>no</i> worship +<i>out</i> of the Church which they approve, <i>to set up a separate worship +for themselves</i>; and by doing this, and giving an example of a rational +and manly worship, men of <i>weight</i> from their <i>rank</i> and literature may +do the greatest service to society and the world."—P. 18, Dr. Price's +Sermon.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_80_80" id="Footnote_80_80" /><a href="#FNanchor_80_80"><span class="label">[80]</span></a> P. 34, Discourse on the Love of our Country, by Dr. +Price.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_81_81" id="Footnote_81_81" /><a href="#FNanchor_81_81"><span class="label">[81]</span></a> 1st Mary, sess. 3, ch. 1.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_82_82" id="Footnote_82_82" /><a href="#FNanchor_82_82"><span class="label">[82]</span></a> "That King James the Second, having endeavored <i>to subvert +the Constitution</i> of the kingdom, by breaking the <i>original contract</i> +between king and people, and, by the advice of Jesuits and other wicked +persons, having violated the <i>fundamental</i> laws, and <i>having withdrawn +himself out of the kingdom</i>, hath <i>abdicated</i> the government, and the +throne is thereby <i>vacant</i>."</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_83_83" id="Footnote_83_83" /><a href="#FNanchor_83_83"><span class="label">[83]</span></a> P. 23, 23, 24.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_84_84" id="Footnote_84_84" /><a href="#FNanchor_84_84"><span class="label">[84]</span></a> See Blackstone's Magna Charta, printed at Oxford, 1759.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_85_85" id="Footnote_85_85" /><a href="#FNanchor_85_85"><span class="label">[85]</span></a> 1 W. and M.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_86_86" id="Footnote_86_86" /><a href="#FNanchor_86_86"><span class="label">[86]</span></a> Ecclesiasticus, chap, xxxviii. ver. 24, 25. "The wisdom of +a learned man cometh by opportunity of leisure: and he that hath little +business shall become wise. How can he get wisdom that holdeth the +plough, and that glorieth in the goad; that driveth oxen, and is +occupied in their labors, and whose talk is of bullocks?" +</p><p> +Ver. 27. "So every carpenter and workmaster, that laboreth night and +day," &c. +</p><p> +Ver. 33. "They shall not be sought for in public counsel, nor sit high +in the congregation: they shall not sit on the judge's seat, nor +understand the sentence of judgment: they cannot declare justice and +judgment, and they shall not be found where parables are spoken." +</p><p> +Ver. 34. "But they will maintain the state of the world." +</p><p> +I do not determine whether this book be canonical, as the Gallican +Church (till lately) has considered it, or apocryphal, as here it is +taken. I am sure it contains a great deal of sense and truth.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_87_87" id="Footnote_87_87" /><a href="#FNanchor_87_87"><span class="label">[87]</span></a> Discourse on the Love of our Country, 3rd edit p. 39.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_88_88" id="Footnote_88_88" /><a href="#FNanchor_88_88"><span class="label">[88]</span></a> Another of these reverend gentlemen, who was witness to +some of the spectacles which Paris has lately exhibited, expresses +himself thus:—"<i>A king dragged in submissive triumph by his conquering +subjects</i> is one of those appearances of grandeur which seldom rise in +the prospect of human affairs, and which, during the remainder of my +life, I shall think of with wonder and gratification." These gentlemen +agree marvellously in their feelings.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_89_89" id="Footnote_89_89" /><a href="#FNanchor_89_89"><span class="label">[89]</span></a> State Trials, Vol. II. p. 360, 363.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_90_90" id="Footnote_90_90" /><a href="#FNanchor_90_90"><span class="label">[90]</span></a> 6th of October, 1789.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_91_91" id="Footnote_91_91" /><a href="#FNanchor_91_91"><span class="label">[91]</span></a> "Tous les Évêques à la lanterne!"</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_92_92" id="Footnote_92_92" /><a href="#FNanchor_92_92"><span class="label">[92]</span></a> It is proper here to refer to a letter written upon this +subject by an eyewitness. That eyewitness was one of the most honest, +intelligent, and eloquent members of the National Assembly, one of the +most active and zealous reformers of the state. He was obliged to secede +from the Assembly; and he afterwards became a voluntary exile, on +account of the horrors of this pious triumph, and the dispositions of +men, who, profiting of crimes, if not causing them, have taken the lead +in public affairs. +</p><p> +<i>Extract of M. de Lally Tollendal's Second Letter to a Friend</i>. +</p><p> +"Parlons du parti que j'ai pris; il est bien justifé dans ma +conscience.—Ni cette ville coupable, ni cette assemblée plus coupable +encore, ne méritoient que je me justifie; mais j'ai à cœur que vous, et +les personnes qui pensent comme vous, ne me condamnent pas.—Ma santé, +je vous jure, me rendoit mes fonctions impossibles; mais même en les +mettant de côté il a été au-dessus de mes forces de supporter plus +longtems l'horreur que me causoit ce sang,—ces têtes,—cette reine +<i>presque egorgée</i>,—ce roi, amené <i>esclave</i>, entrant à Paris au milieu +de ses assassins, et précédé des têtes de ses malheureux gardes,—ces +perfides janissaires, ces assassins, ces femmes cannibales,—ce cri de +TOUS LES ÉVÊQUES À LA LANTERNE, dans le moment où le roi entre sa +capitale avec deux évêques de son conseil dans sa voiture,—un <i>coup de +fusil</i>, que j'ai vu tirer dans un <i>des carrosses de la reine</i>,—M. +Bailly appellant cela <i>un beau jour</i>,—l'assemblée ayant déclaré +froidement le matin, qu'il n'étoit pas de sa dignité d'aller toute +entière environner le roi,—M. Mirabeau disant impunément dans cette +assemblée, que le vaisseau de l'état, loin d'être arrêté dans sa course, +s'élanceroit avec plus de rapidité que jamais vers sa régénération,—M. +Barnave, riant avec lui, quand des flots de sang couloient autour de +nous,—le vertueux Mounier<a name="FNanchor_A_93" id="FNanchor_A_93"></a><a href="#Footnote_A_93" class="fnanchor" title=" N.B.M. Mounier was then speaker of the National Assembly. +He has since been obliged to live in exile, though one of the firmest +assertors of liberty.">[A]</a> échappant par miracle à vingt assassins, +qui avoient voulu faire de sa tête un trophée de plus: Voilà ce qui me +fit jurer de ne plus mettre le pied <i>dans cette caverne d'Antropophages</i> +[The National Assembly], où je n'avois plus de force d'élever la voix, +où depuis six semaines je l'avois élevée en vain. +</p><p> +"Moi, Mounier, et tous les honnêtes gens, ont pensé que le dernier +effort à faire pour le bien étoit d'en sortir. Aucune idée de crainte ne +s'est approchée de moi. Je rougirois de m'en défendre. J'avois encore +reçû sur la route de la part de ce peuple, moins coupable que ceux qui +l'ont enivré de fureur, des acclamations, et des applaudissements, dont +d'autres auroient été flattés, et qui m'ont fait frémir. C'est à +l'indignation, c'est à l'horreur, c'est aux convulsions physiques, que +le seul aspect du sang me fait éprouver que j'ai cédé. On brave une +seule mort; on la brave plusieurs fois, quand elle peut être utile. Mais +aucune puissance sous le ciel, mais aucune opinion publique ou privée +n'ont le droit de me condamner à souffrir inutilement mille supplices +par minute, et à périr de désespoir, de rage, au milieu des <i>triomphes</i>, +du crime que je n'ai pu arrêter. Ils me proscriront, ils confisqueront +mes biens. Je labourerai la terre, et je ne les verrai plus. Voilà ma +justification. Vous pourrez la lire, la montrer, la laisser copier; tant +pis pour ceux qui ne la comprendront pas; ce ne sera alors moi qui +auroit eu tort de la leur donner." +</p><p> +This military man had not so good nerves as the peaceable gentlemen of +the Old Jewry.—See Mons. Mounier's narrative of these transactions: a +man also of honor and virtue and talents, and therefore a fugitive.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_A_93" id="Footnote_A_93" /><a href="#FNanchor_A_93"><span class="label">[A]</span></a> N.B.M. Mounier was then speaker of the National Assembly. +He has since been obliged to live in exile, though one of the firmest +assertors of liberty.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_93_94" id="Footnote_93_94" /><a href="#FNanchor_93_94"><span class="label">[93]</span></a> See the fate of Bailly and Condorcet, supposed to be here +particularly alluded to. Compare the circumstances of the trial and +execution of the former with this prediction.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_94_95" id="Footnote_94_95" /><a href="#FNanchor_94_95"><span class="label">[94]</span></a> The English are, I conceive, misrepresented in a letter +published in one of the papers, by a gentleman thought to be a +Dissenting minister. When writing to Dr. Price of the spirit which +prevails at Paris, he says,—"The spirit of the people in this place has +abolished all the proud <i>distinctions</i> which the <i>king</i> and <i>nobles</i> had +usurped in their minds: whether they talk of <i>the king, the noble, or +the priest</i>, their whole language is that of the most <i>enlightened and +liberal amongst the English</i>." If this gentleman means to confine the +terms <i>enlightened and liberal</i> to one set of men in England, it may be +true. It is not generally so.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_95_96" id="Footnote_95_96" /><a href="#FNanchor_95_96"><span class="label">[95]</span></a> Sit igitur hoc ab initio persuasum civibus, dominos esse +omnium rerum ac moderatores deos; eaque, quæ gerantur, eorum geri vi, +ditione, ac numine; eosdemque optime de genere hominum mereri; et qualis +quisque sit, quid agat, quid in se admittat, qua mente, qua pietate +colat religiones intueri: piorum et impiorum habere rationem. His enim +rebus imbutæ mentes haud sane abhorrebunt ab utili et a vera +sententia.—Cic. de Legibus, l. 2.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_96_97" id="Footnote_96_97" /><a href="#FNanchor_96_97"><span class="label">[96]</span></a> Quicquid multis peccatur inultum.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_97_98" id="Footnote_97_98" /><a href="#FNanchor_97_98"><span class="label">[97]</span></a> This (down to the end of the first sentence in the next +paragraph) and some other parts, here and there, were inserted, on his +reading the manuscript, by my lost son.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_98_99" id="Footnote_98_99" /><a href="#FNanchor_98_99"><span class="label">[98]</span></a> I do not choose to shock the feeling of the moral reader +with any quotation of their vulgar, base, and profane language.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_99_100" id="Footnote_99_100" /><a href="#FNanchor_99_100"><span class="label">[99]</span></a> Their connection with Turgot and almost all the people of +the finance.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_100_101" id="Footnote_100_101" /><a href="#FNanchor_100_101"><span class="label">[100]</span></a> All have been confiscated in their turn.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_101_102" id="Footnote_101_102" /><a href="#FNanchor_101_102"><span class="label">[101]</span></a> Not his brother, nor any near relation; but this mistake +does not affect the argument.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_102_103" id="Footnote_102_103" /><a href="#FNanchor_102_103"><span class="label">[102]</span></a> The rest of the passage is this:— +</p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span style="margin-left: -.5em;">"Who, having spent the treasures of his crown,<br /></span> +<span>Condemns their luxury to feed his own.<br /></span> +<span>And yet this act, to varnish o'er the shame<br /></span> +<span>Of sacrilege, must bear Devotion's name.<br /></span> +<span>No crime so bold, but would be understood<br /></span> +<span>A Real, or at least a seeming good.<br /></span> +<span>Who fears not to do ill, yet fears the name,<br /></span> +<span>And free from conscience, is a slave to fame.<br /></span> +<span>Thus he the Church at once protects and spoils:<br /></span> +<span>But princes' swords are sharper than their styles.<br /></span> +<span>And thus to th' ages past he makes amends,<br /></span> +<span>Their charity destroys, their faith defends.<br /></span> +<span>Then did Religion in a lazy cell,<br /></span> +<span>In empty, airy contemplations, dwell;<br /></span> +<span>And like the block, unmovèd lay: but ours,<br /></span> +<span>As much too active, like the stork devours.<br /></span> +<span>Is there no temperate region can be known<br /></span> +<span>Betwixt their frigid and our torrid zone?<br /></span> +<span>Could we not wake from that lethargic dream,<br /></span> +<span>But to be restless in a worse extreme?<br /></span> +<span>And for that lethargy was there no care,<br /></span> +<span>But to be cast into a calenture?<br /></span> +<span>Can knowledge have no bound, but must advance<br /></span> +<span>So far, to make us wish for ignorance,<br /></span> +<span>And rather in the dark to grope our way,<br /></span> +<span>Than, led by a false guide, to err by day?<br /></span> +<span>Who sees these dismal heaps, but would demand<br /></span> +<span>What barbarous invader sack'd the land?<br /></span> +<span>But when he hears no Goth, no Turk did bring<br /></span> +<span>This desolation, but a Christian king,<br /></span> +<span>When nothing but the name of zeal appears<br /></span> +<span>'Twixt our best actions and the worst of theirs,<br /></span> +<span>What does he think our sacrilege would spare,<br /></span> +<span>When such th' effects of our devotions are?"<br /></span> +<span><br /></span> +<span class="citation"><i>Cooper's Hill</i>, by Sir JOHN DENHAM.<br /></span> +</div></div> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_103_104" id="Footnote_103_104" /><a href="#FNanchor_103_104"><span class="label">[103]</span></a> Rapport de Mons. le Directeur-Général des Finances, fait +par Ordre du Roi à Versailles. Mai 5, 1789.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_104_105" id="Footnote_104_105" /><a href="#FNanchor_104_105"><span class="label">[104]</span></a> In the Constitution of Scotland, during the Stuart +reigns, a committee sat for preparing bills; and none could pass, but +those previously approved by them. This committee was called Lords of +Articles.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_105_106" id="Footnote_105_106" /><a href="#FNanchor_105_106"><span class="label">[105]</span></a> When I wrote this I quoted from memory, after many years +had elapsed from my reading the passage. A learned friend has found it +and it is as follows:— +</p><p title=" +[Greek: To êthos to auto, kai amphô despotika tôn beltionôn, kai ta psêphismata +hôsper ekei ta epitagmata, kai ho dêmagôgos kai ho kolax hoi autoi +kai analogon. kai malista d' hekateroi par' hekaterois ischuousin, hoi +men kolakes para tois turannois, hoi de dêmagôgoi para tois dêmois tois +toioutois.]"> +τὸ ἠ̂θος τὸ αὐτό, καὶ ἄμφω δεσποτικὰ τω̂ν βελτιόνων, καὶ τὰ +ψηφίσματα ὥσπερ ἐκει̂ τὰ ἐπιτάγματα, καὶ ὁ δημαγωγὸς καὶ ὁ +κόλαξ οἱ αὐτοὶ καὶ ἀνάλογον. καὶ μάλιστα δ' ἑκάτεροι παρ' +ἑκατέροις ἰσχύουσιν, οἱ μὲν κόλακες παρὰ τοι̂ς τυράννοις, οἱ +δὲ δημαγωγοὶ παρὰ τοι̂ς δήμοις τοι̂ς τοιούτοις. +</p><p> +"The ethical character is the same: both exercise despotism over the +better class of citizens; and decrees are in the one what ordinances and +arrêts are in the other: the demagogue, too, and the court favorite, are +not unfrequently the same identical men, and always bear a close +analogy; and these have the principal power, each in their respective +forms of government, favorites with the absolute monarch, and demagogues +with a people such as I have described."—Arist. Politic. lib. iv. cap. +4.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_106_107" id="Footnote_106_107" /><a href="#FNanchor_106_107"><span class="label">[106]</span></a> De l'Administration des Finances de la France, par Mons. +Necker, Vol. I. p. 288.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_107_108" id="Footnote_107_108" /><a href="#FNanchor_107_108"><span class="label">[107]</span></a> De l'Administration des Finances de la France, par M. +Necker.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_108_109" id="Footnote_108_109" /><a href="#FNanchor_108_109"><span class="label">[108]</span></a> Vol. III. chap. 8 and chap. 9.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_109_110" id="Footnote_109_110" /><a href="#FNanchor_109_110"><span class="label">[109]</span></a> The world is obliged to M. de Calonne for the pains he +has taken to refute the scandalous exaggerations relative to some of the +royal expenses, and to detect the fallacious account given of pensions, +for the wicked purpose of provoking the populace to all sorts of +crimes.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_110_111" id="Footnote_110_111" /><a href="#FNanchor_110_111"><span class="label">[110]</span></a> See Gulliver's Travels for the idea of countries governed +by philosophers.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_111_112" id="Footnote_111_112" /><a href="#FNanchor_111_112"><span class="label">[111]</span></a> M. de Calonne states the falling off of the population of +Paris as far more considerable; and it may be so, since the period of M. +Necker's calculation.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><a name="Footnote_112_113" id="Footnote_112_113" /><a href="#FNanchor_112_113"><span class="label">[112]</span></a> +<table border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" summary=""><tr> <td></td> <td align="center">Livres.</td> <td align="center">£</td> <td align="center">s.</td> <td align="center">d.</td></tr> +<tr> <td>Travaux de charité pour subvenir + au manque de travail à Paris et dans les provinces</td> <td align="right">3,866,920</td> <td align="right">161,121</td> <td align="right">13</td> <td align="right">4</td></tr> +<tr><td>Destruction de vagabondage et de la + mendicité</td> <td align="right">1,671,417</td> <td align="right">69,642</td> <td align="right">7</td> <td align="right">6</td></tr> +<tr><td>Primes pour l'importation de grains</td> <td align="right">5,671,907</td> <td align="right">235,329</td> <td align="right">9</td> <td align="right">2</td></tr> +<tr><td>Dépenses relatives aux subsistances, + déduction fait des reconvrements + qui out en lieu</td> <td align="right" class="bb">39,871,790</td> <td align="right" class="bb">1,661,324</td> <td align="right" class="bb">11</td> <td align="right" class="bb">8</td></tr> +<tr> <td align="right">Total </td> <td align="right">51,082,034</td> <td align="right">2,128,418</td> <td align="right">1</td> <td align="right">8</td></tr></table> + +<p> +When I sent this book to the press, I entertained some doubt concerning +the nature and extent of the last article in the above accounts, which +is only under a general head, without any detail. Since then I have seen +M. de Calonne's work. I must think it a great loss to me that I had not +that advantage earlier. M. de Calonne thinks this article to be on +account of general subsistence; but as he is not able to comprehend how +so great a loss as upwards of 1,661,000<i>l.</i> sterling could be sustained +on the difference between the price and the sale of grain, he seems to +attribute this enormous head of charge to secret expenses of the +Revolution. I cannot say anything positively on that subject. The reader +is capable of judging, by the aggregate of these immense charges, on the +state and condition of France, and the system of public economy adopted +in that nation. These articles of account produced no inquiry or +discussion in the National Assembly.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_113_114" id="Footnote_113_114" /><a href="#FNanchor_113_114"><span class="label">[113]</span></a> This is on a supposition of the truth of this story; but +he was not in France at the time. One name serves as well as another.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_114_115" id="Footnote_114_115" /><a href="#FNanchor_114_115"><span class="label">[114]</span></a> Domat.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_115_116" id="Footnote_115_116" /><a href="#FNanchor_115_116"><span class="label">[115]</span></a> Speech of M. Camus, published by order of the National +Assembly.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_116_117" id="Footnote_116_117" /><a href="#FNanchor_116_117"><span class="label">[116]</span></a> Whether the following description is strictly true I know +not; but it is what the publishers would have pass for true, in order to +animate others. In a letter from Toul, given in one of their papers, is +the following passage concerning the people of that district:—"Dans la +Révolution actuelle, ils ont résisté à toutes les <i>séductions du +bigotisme, aux persécutions et aux tracasseries</i> des ennemis de la +Révolution. <i>Oubliant leurs plus grands intérêts</i> pour rendre hommage +aux vues d'ordre général qui out déterminé l'Assemblée Nationale, ils +voient, <i>sans se plaindre</i>, supprimer cette foule d'établissemens +ecclésiastiques par lesquels <i>ils subsistoient</i>; et même, en perdant +leur siège épiscopal, la seule de toutes ces ressources qui pouvoit, on +plutôt <i>qui devoit, en toute équité</i>, leur être conservée, condamnés <i>à +la plus effrayante misère</i> sans avoir <i>été ni pu être entendus, ils ne +murmurent point</i>, ils restent fidèles aux principes du plus pur +patriotisme; ils sont encore prêts à <i>verser leur sang</i> pour le maintien +de la constitution, qui va réduire leur ville <i>à la plus déplorable +nullité</i>."—These people are not supposed to have endured those +sufferings and injustices in a struggle for liberty, for the same +account states truly that they have been always free; their patience in +beggary and ruin, and their suffering, without remonstrance, the most +flagrant and confessed injustice, if strictly true, can be nothing but +the effect of this dire fanaticism. A great multitude all over France is +in the same condition and the same temper.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_117_118" id="Footnote_117_118" /><a href="#FNanchor_117_118"><span class="label">[117]</span></a> See the proceedings of the confederation at Nantes.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_118_119" id="Footnote_118_119" /><a href="#FNanchor_118_119"><span class="label">[118]</span></a> "Si plures sunt ii quibus improbe datum est, quam illi +quibus injuste ademptum est, idcirco plus etiam valent? Non enim numero +hæc judicantur, sed pondere. Quam autem habet æquitatem, ut agrum multis +annis, aut etiam sæculis ante possessum, qui nullum habuit habeat, qui +autem habuit amittat? Ac, propter hoc injuriæ genus, Lacedæmonii +Lysandrum Ephorum expulerunt; Agin regem (quod nunquam antea apud eos +acciderat) necaverunt; exque eo tempore tantæ discordiæ secutæ sunt, ut +et tyranni exsisterent, et optimates exterminarentur, et preclarissime +constituta respublica dilaberetur. Nec vero solum ipsa cecidit, sed +etiam reliquam Græciam evertit contagionibus malorum, quæ a Lacedæmoniis +profectæ manarunt latius."—After speaking of the conduct of the model +of true patriots, Aratus of Sicyon, which was in a very different +spirit, he says,—"Sic par est agere cum civibus; non (ut bis jam +vidimus) hastam in foro ponere et bona civium voci subjicere præconis. +At ille Græcus (id quod fuit sapientis et præstantis viri) omnibus +consulendum esse putavit: eaque est summa ratio et sapientia boni civis, +commoda civium non divellere, sed omnes eadem æquitate continere."—Cic. +Off. 1. 2.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_119_120" id="Footnote_119_120" /><a href="#FNanchor_119_120"><span class="label">[119]</span></a> See two books entitled, "Einige Originalschriften des +Illuminatenordens,"—"System und Folgen des Illuminatenordens." München, +1787.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_120_121" id="Footnote_120_121" /><a href="#FNanchor_120_121"><span class="label">[120]</span></a> A leading member of the Assembly, M. Rabaut de St. +Étienne, has expressed the principle of all their proceedings as clearly +as possible; nothing can be more simple:—"<i>Tous les établissemens en +France couronnent le malheur du peuple: pour le rendre heureux, il faut +le renouveler, changer ses idées, changer ses loix, changer ses mœurs, +... changer les hommes, changer les choses, changer ses mots, ... tout +détruire; oui, tout détruire; puisque tout est à récréer</i>."—This +gentleman was chosen president in an assembly not sitting at +<i>Quinze-Vingt</i> or the <i>Petites Maisons</i>, and composed of persons giving +themselves out to be rational beings; but neither his ideas, language, +or conduct differ in the smallest degree from the discourses, opinions, +and actions of those, within and without the Assembly, who direct the +operations of the machine now at work in France.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_121_122" id="Footnote_121_122" /><a href="#FNanchor_121_122"><span class="label">[121]</span></a> The Assembly, in executing the plan of their committee, +made some alterations. They have struck out one stage in these +gradations; this removes a part of the objection; but the main +objection, namely, that in their scheme the first constituent voter has +no connection with the representative legislator, remains in all its +force. There are other alterations, some possibly for the better, some +certainly for the worse: but to the author the merit or demerit of these +smaller alterations appears to be of no moment, where the scheme itself +is fundamentally vicious and absurd.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_122_123" id="Footnote_122_123" /><a href="#FNanchor_122_123"><span class="label">[122]</span></a> "Non, ut olim, universæ legiones deducebantur, cum +tribunis, et centurionibus, et sui cujusque ordinis militibus, ut +consensu et caritate rempublicam efficerent; sed ignoti inter se, +diversis manipulis, sine rectore, sine affectibus mutuis, quasi ex alio +genere mortalium repente in unum collecti, numerus magis quam +colonia."—Tac. Annal. lib. 14, sect. 27.—All this will be still more +applicable to the unconnected, rotatory, biennial national assemblies, +in this absurd and senseless constitution.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_123_124" id="Footnote_123_124" /><a href="#FNanchor_123_124"><span class="label">[123]</span></a> Qualitas, Relatio, Actio, Passio, Ubi, Quando, Situs, +Habitus.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_124_125" id="Footnote_124_125" /><a href="#FNanchor_124_125"><span class="label">[124]</span></a> See l'État de la France, p. 363.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_125_126" id="Footnote_125_126" /><a href="#FNanchor_125_126"><span class="label">[125]</span></a> In reality three, to reckon the provincial republican +establishments.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_126_127" id="Footnote_126_127" /><a href="#FNanchor_126_127"><span class="label">[126]</span></a> For further elucidations upon the subject of all these +judicatures and of the Committee of Research, see M. de Calonne's work.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_127_128" id="Footnote_127_128" /><a href="#FNanchor_127_128"><span class="label">[127]</span></a> "Comme sa Majesté a reconnu, non un système +d'associations particulières, mais une réunion de volontés de tous les +François pour la liberté et la prospérité communes, ainsi pour le +maintien de l'ordre publique, il a pensé qu'il convenoit que chaque +régiment prît part à ces fêtes civiques pour multiplier les rapports, et +resserrer les liens d'union entre les citoyens et les troupes."—Lest I +should not be credited, I insert the words authorizing the troops to +feast with the popular confederacies.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_128_129" id="Footnote_128_129" /><a href="#FNanchor_128_129"><span class="label">[128]</span></a> This war minister has since quitted the school and +resigned his office.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_129_130" id="Footnote_129_130" /><a href="#FNanchor_129_130"><span class="label">[129]</span></a> Courrier François, 30 July, 1790. Assemblée Nationale, +Numero 210.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_130_131" id="Footnote_130_131" /><a href="#FNanchor_130_131"><span class="label">[130]</span></a> I see by M. Necker's account, that the national guards of +Paris have received, over and above the money levied within their own +city, about 145,000<i>l.</i> sterling out of the public treasure. Whether +this be an actual payment for the nine months of their existence, or an +estimate of their yearly charge, I do not clearly perceive. It is of no +great importance, as certainly they may take whatever they please.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_131_132" id="Footnote_131_132" /><a href="#FNanchor_131_132"><span class="label">[131]</span></a> The reader will observe that I have but lightly touched +(my plan demanded nothing more) on the condition of the French finances +as connected with the demands upon them. If I had intended to do +otherwise, the materials in my hands for such a task are not altogether +perfect. On this subject I refer the reader to M. de Calonne's work, and +the tremendous display that he has made of the havoc and devastation in +the public estate, and in all the affairs of France, caused by the +presumptuous good intentions of ignorance and incapacity. Such effects +those causes will always produce. Looking over that account with a +pretty strict eye, and, with perhaps too much rigor, deducting +everything which may be placed to the account of a financier out of +place, who might be supposed by his enemies desirous of making the most +of his cause, I believe it will be found that a more salutary lesson of +caution against the daring spirit of innovators than what has been +supplied at the expense of France never was at any time furnished to +mankind.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_132_133" id="Footnote_132_133" /><a href="#FNanchor_132_133"><span class="label">[132]</span></a> La Bruyère of Bossuet.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_133_134" id="Footnote_133_134" /><a href="#FNanchor_133_134"><span class="label">[133]</span></a> "Ce n'est point à l'assemblée entière que je m'adresse +ici; je ne parle qu'à ceux qui l'égarent, en lui cachant sous des gazes +séduisantes le but où ils l'entraînent. C'est à eux que je dis: Votre +objet, vous n'en disconviendrez pas, c'est d'ôter tout espoir au clergé, +et de consommer sa ruine; c'est-là, en ne vous soupçonnant d'aucune +combinaison de cupidité, d'aucun regard sur le jeu des effets publics, +c'est-là ce qu'on doit croire que vous avez en vue dans la terrible +opération que vous proposez; c'est ce qui doit en être le fruit. Mais le +peuple qui vous y intéressez, quel avantage peut-il y trouver? En vous +servant sans cesse de lui, que faites-vous pour lui? Rien, absolument +rien; et, au contraire, vous faites ce qui ne conduit qu'à l'accabler de +nouvelles charges. Vous avez rejeté, à son préjudice, une offre de 400 +millions, dont l'acceptation pouvoit devenir un moyen de soulagement en +sa faveur; et à cette ressource, aussi profitable que légitime, vous +avez substitué une injustice ruineuse, qui, de votre propre aveu, charge +le trésor public, et par consequent le peuple, d'un surcroît de dépense +annuelle de 50 millions an moins, et d'un remboursement de 150 millions. +</p><p> +"Malheureux peuple! voilà ce que vous vaut en dernier résultat +l'expropriation de l'Église, et la dureté des décrets taxateurs du +traitement des ministres d'une religion bienfaisante; et désormais ils +scront à votre charge: leurs charités soulageoient les pauvres; et vous +allez être imposés pour subvenir à leur entretien!"—<i>De l'État de la +France,</i> p. 81. See also p. 92, and the following pages.</p></div> + +</div> + + +<h3>END OF VOL. 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